Being the network: Start-up technology developer aims to make a mesh of wireless

A new wireless infrastructure vendor plans to make its public debut at the Cellular Telecom-munications Industry Association's Wireless 2000 show this week in New Orleans with the introduction of a network system that relies not on base stations, towers or switches, but people.

In MeshNetworks' wireless vision, wireless network users and the mobile devices they carry actually will become the network, thereby reducing the amount of hard-wired infrastructure required.

The company's technology scheme, ArachNet, is described as a "self-organizing" platform based on a patented software and chipset design and a packet-based network scheme that adopts characteristics of CDMA and TDMA air interface technologies.

"With an ArachNet platform, the phones communicate with each other and into the network. The intelligence of the base station is actually being moved into a handset," said Richard Licursi, interim CEO of MeshNetworks. "The secret here is an elastic virtual circuit - a network that is constantly evaluating itself and predicting potential points of failure."

The secret is gleaned from formerly proprietary military communications technology. MeshNetworks' parent is Military Commercial Tech-nologies, which acquires technology formats from military contractors and adapts them for commercial use.

"We create and incubate high-tech companies," said Mike Buffa, chairman and CEO of MILCOM. "The technologies must be proven and well-funded, and we have some key military executives who help us find the technologies we want and are able to open the doors we need."

One of the more recognizable communications technology companies MILCOM has incubated is Triton Network Systems, the broadband wireless radio developer whose Consecutive Point network format was adapted from an Apache helicopter radio system.

MILCOM also backs companies creating technologies such as video streaming, asynchronous circuits and fiber and wireless bandwidth enhancement.

The technology behind Mesh-Networks was developed by military contractor ITT for the Department of Defense as a mode of battlefield communications. ITT's assignment was to design a system that could transport voice, video and data, support battlefield requirements for precision location without using the global positioning system and function at high-mobility speeds and in harsh environmental conditions without relying on fixed infrastructure.

"The ITT charge was to develop a technology that would allow the individual soldier to instantly be on a network to talk to certain people, but not to everyone else," said Matt Bigge, chief operating and financial officer for MILCOM. "The challenge for us was to take that proven technology and apply it in a commercial setting."

MeshNetworks touts many advantages to the commercial system it is designing: fast deployment, precision location to 99.9% accuracy, comparable quality and reliability to traditional systems and lower infrastructure investment.

"In effect, you do not need nearly as many base stations as current technologies require," Licursi said. A network using the ArachNet format will cost 10 to 30 times less than one relying on traditional networking methods, he estimated. "As the user numbers grow, you can put in additional gateways to enhance the networking capacity."

When the technology is ready, target markets will be wireless service providers, network system vendors, mobile device manufacturers and operating system and software developers. However, the ArachNet format is about two years from commercial prime time, Licursi said. That time lag doesn't concern the company because the concept will be optimized for third generation applications such as mobile Internet and full-motion voice and video, and the timing of its release should coincide with a peak in 3G deployment.

"It's really evolutionary," Bigge said. "It's at once compatible with existing and projected standards but also builds on those standards by providing the peer-to-peer relationship and eliminating a lot of the traffic that travels through the base stations."

So what of detractors who likely will scoff at the merits of the technology? They don't faze the company, which has raised investments easily and has received positive responses from the service provider and manufacturer communities.

"We've been through the challenges, we've been through the naysayers and we've come back with answers to how the technology can work," Bigge said. "I never expected this laughable degree of ease in attracting high-level investment."