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EION Wireless?

Just wondering if anyone has heard of them, or seen any of their deployments?

They have a product that claims up to 3KM range to mobile devices from a single AP.

Yes. I was in their office in Kanata. That was a few years ago. I've seen their mobile test setups around Ottawa. I didn't go with their gear - it didn't fit for me.

It is actually possible to get 3km range from a typical smartphone to an "WiFi" AP if there is a beam aimed directly at the device. But it is not practical to provide broadband service to even a dozen smartphones at such long range.

Kalai Kalaichelvan, a manager from Nortel who was working on IP routers when I was there, started EION Wireless around the same time (2003) as I staretd Radialink. One of their R&D guys used to visit our office and pick up stuff. I was invited to visit them in 2004 but did not manage to do it for some reason.

AFAIK they used to assemble WiFi-based systems of their own and later purchased all the WISP radio designs from OFDM pioneer WiLAN who exited the hardware business.

Thanks for the info guys. I hope they do well, but I was a little bit hesitant about the idea of servicing an entire town from one or two AP's. We're a traditional fixed wireless outfit, so I don't have a lot of experience connecting to consumer devices at long ranges.

Perhaps their gear can help fill the void in some of the remote areas.