The SkyWay product line from Solectek is targeted to carriers, providers, or multi-building Enterprises who wish to extend their network data transmissions wirelessly to subscribers or other buildings. The wireless radios are offered in multiple formats targeting various market segments and operating over differing frequencies; and provide support for both point-to-point backhaul extension as well as point-to-multipoint subscriber delivery (depending on the model selected).

Current entries in the product line include:

- SkyWay EB Series: A point-to-point Gigabit backbone link offered in short range (a 1 foot diameter antenna) and long range (a 2 foot diameter antenna) configurations supporting a potential maximum distance of about 6.8 miles. The EB gear leverages a narrow (just less than 1 degree in the short range, and half-a-degree in the long range) data delivery beam to produce Gig Ethernet transmission rates of up to 1.25 Gb/sec. Flavors of the EB product are offered operating in both the 70 GHz licensed band and the 60 GHz unlicensed band.

- SkyWay FSO-100E: A Free Space Optics product that boasts 200 Mb/sec aggregate throughput (100 Mb/sec one-way) at distances of from 20 to 100 meters. Features include a "link fault pass through" capability and PoE support.

- SkyWay Max: A point-to-multipoint platform supporting data delivery using the WiMAX (802.16d-2004) standard. SkyWay Max operates in the licensed 3.5 GHz spectrum, with a fully populated base station potentially delivering an aggregate 208 Mb/sec of throughput (26 Mb/sec per sector times eight sectors). Components of the platform include the Base station (including the outdoor "sectors" and the indoor control unit) and the subscriber station, which itself includes the outdoor CPE and an indoor Network Gateway (featuring a WiFi Router, Ethernet switch, and either POTS or VoIP interfaces).

- SkyWay 4000/7000 Professional Series: Offered in both point-to-point and point-to-multipoint flavors and operating in the licensed 4.9 (4000) and unlicensed 5 (7000) GHz bands. Performance ranges from 1.5 (4000) or 6 (7000) to 108 Mb/sec, while point-to-point distance specifications range from 2 to 22 miles in the 4000 line and from 4 to 30 miles in the 7000 line. Point-to-multipoint distances are shorter; from 1.2 to 6 miles in the 4000 line (when using a sectoral base station; .6 to 3 miles when using an omnidirectional base station) and from 1 to 4.5 miles in the 7000 series. Visit the vendor's Web site for details as to how these distance measurements were arrived at.

A key new feature of the Professional series offerings is their support for "SkyWay-Videocast," which the vendor says improves video-traffic-specific data transmission by altering base-station replication behavior such that multicast traffic is forwarded across the internal bridge, without replicating it/transmitting the traffic back into the wireless network. The enhancement is especially targeted to video surveillance networks where multiple viewers may need to see the same video screens.

All but the SkyWay MAX products are available now; SkyWay MAX is currently in late-beta and expected to be generally available in January.

Visit the SolecTek Web site for further information.

product submission by EITPlanet Staff

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