Press Releases
Northumberland Selects SkyPilot for County Wireless Network
New Network to Provide ‘Last-Mile’ and Wi-Fi Hotspots Services
SANTA CLARA, CA – (BUSINESS WIRE) – May 20, 2008 – SkyPilot Networks, a leading provider of carrier-class broadband wireless networks, today announced that the Northumberland County Council has awarded KBR IT & Networking Solutions, a SkyPilot AirPower Channel Partner, to install a new wireless data network in Alnwick, Northumberland. The network, powered by SkyPilot equipment, will provide wireless connectivity from the county’s multi-gigabit fibre core to various county services.
Northumberland Computer Services Division was short listed in the 2008 Best Practice Awards for the development of the North-Net “Beyond Borders” project. This collaborative, partnership approach has also contributed to the project being short listed in 2007 in the “Innovative Project of the Year” category of the prestigious annual Computing Awards for Excellence against major competition from organisations such as Channel 4, BT and BBC Worldwide. The project provides for a powerful new data network throughout the county, which will put Northumberland into the United Kingdom’s “Top 3” cutting-edge performers for digital connectivity. Providing connectivity deployment for the last mile delivery from the multi-gigabit fibre core across the county from nine Points of Presence was seen as integral to the project success.
Scheduled to be completed by end of June 2008, the Alnwick Town cluster was allocated as the first test case for the project, delivering not only public services to buildings but also providing the availability of mobile access at street level. “This provides mobile staff communications, seamlessly managing mesh backhaul traffic back to the fibre core. The technology will provide excellent delivery of e-Business, provide access for the Community at all levels and provide the vehicle for last mile delivery for the North-Net fibre core ring,” said Frank Freeman, Project Manager for Northumberland Open Network (North-Net).
In order to meet these challenges, KBR, in conjunction with SkyPilot’s value-added distributor Avnet, was chosen to design and deploy the network. Established for over 24 years, KBR has been designing, installing and maintaining leading-edge solutions for wireless data and voice applications in northern UK. “After extensive testing, SkyPilot was chosen as the delivery platform because its SkyExtender DualBand offers integrated client access for serving various public and municipal applications, whilst also giving full failover resilience,” said Gareth Tomlin, Technical Director of Wireless for KBR.
“Northumberland is leveraging the advanced solution from SkyPilot to provide a valuable broadband wireless network throughout the Alnwick Cluster Area,” said Dennis Stipati, vice president of worldwide sales at SkyPilot. “By combining SkyPilot’s 5 GHz multi-hop backhaul with customer premise equipment (CPE) and 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi, this network will provide both ‘last-mile’ access to municipal buildings, schools, and libraries as well as hotspots to areas like the town center.”
About SkyPilot Networks
SkyPilot Networks is a leading provider of carrier-class wireless mesh solutions that enable service providers, municipalities, and public safety agencies to rapidly deploy cost-effective broadband access, voice over IP, public and private Wi-Fi access, video surveillance, and other wireless applications. The SkyPilot solution utilizes a patent-pending synchronous mesh architecture with high-speed switched directional antenna arrays that extends reach, mitigates interference, and maximizes spectral reuse. The result is a highly scalable, reliable, and deterministic mesh network that simplifies design, increases deployment flexibility, and dramatically reduces equipment and operating costs. SkyPilot has proven scalability and reliability with over 35,000 units shipped to customers in over 50 countries. SkyPilot is a privately held company based in Santa Clara, California. For more information on SkyPilot and its solutions, contact pr@skypilot.com or visit http://www.skypilot.com.
