New GigXone Small Cell Wireless System for Metropolitan and HotZone Areas Paves the Way for Mobile and Fixed Carriers to Offer Customers "Gig Zone" Personal Plans for Access to Video and Rich Content, and New Managed/Hosted Wireless Services to Businesses and Local Internet Service Providers

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BelAir Networks

15 Nov, 2011, 15:27 GMT

OTTAWA, Ontario, November 15, 2011 /PRNewswire/ --

- BelAir Networks GigXone System Integrates with Carriers' Existing Networks and Billing Systems and Can Scale to Manage Tens of 1,000s of Multimode Access Points

BelAir Networks, the leader in multimode small cell wireless systems for mobile and fixed carriers, today announced the GigXone™ small cell system for mobile carriers who are challenged to offer their customers sufficient network data capacity and wireless coverage in dense metropolitan areas, HotZones, office and school campus locations and for fixed carriers who want to offer wireless access outside. With GigXone, the personal "Gig" broadband experience is possible without the high cost of today's macro cellular only networks.

(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20111115/NY07011 )

The GigXone system of multimode or Wi-Fi small cell network access and backhaul options is especially suited to extend existing broadband services into densely populated areas challenged by macro cellular coverage, capacity and/or backhaul issues, or overall business economics associated with providing sufficient wireless coverage and capacity in such areas, both indoors and outside. GigXone is built on BelAir Networks many years of proven carrier Wi-Fi network integration with carriers' existing service infrastructure and billing systems.

"Small cells are not just about 3G offload anymore as our carrier customers want to offer a reliable brand experience throughout their network service areas, regardless of radio access technologies," said Bernard Herscovich, President and CEO, BelAir Networks. "Mobile and cable carrier customers asked us to build a highly scalable system well suited for indoor and outdoor, business and consumers, with multimode small cell options for licensed and unlicensed, and that's what we did with GigXone."

With the new controllers and the new software functionalities within the small cells, a GigXone network can support several new and differentiated business models for carriers. BelAir Networks unique ability to virtualize small cells and support access to up to eight different Virtual Local Area Networks (VLAN) on each small cell with individual subscriber or class-based policy settings tied to the existing billing network, means carriers can offer a variety of new hosted or managed services to subscribers, businesses, schools, building owners, and other service providers via shared network access. Virtual small cells enable each SSID to be independently configured to connect to different carrier core networks. Security, mobility, AAA and DHCP parameters can also be set on a per SSID basis.

New Business Models

  • Carrier Managed Services for small and medium businesses, retail shops, malls and building owners using Wi-Fi or multimode small cells (Wi-Fi, 3G/Wi-Fi) for indoor, outdoor and campus coverage for their own business.
  • Carrier Managed Services for businesses where each carrier customer can offer private or public wireless access for their customers, vendors and partners.
  • Carrier Hosted Services where small cell networks are used as shared access among customers with secure VLAN integration to the customers' own core networks for billing/authentication or the carrier's core for a fully managed/hosted service.
  • MVNO shared access where small cell networks are used as shared access among existing or new MVNO customers with secure VLAN integration to the customers' own core networks for billing/authentication or the carrier's core for fully managed/hosted MVNO services - extending wireless from cellular to metro gigabit class access.
  • Co-location Services enabling multiple operators to share common network infrastructure.

"Building a small cell network once and leveraging it many more times is Nirvana for carriers and their investors in these CapEx strained times," said Ronny Haraldsvik, Senior Vice-President/Chief Marketing Officer, BelAir Networks. "Our virtualized access approach to small cells has opened the door for our carrier customers to engage in both retail and wholesale service delivery models where GigXone is the perfect low-cost, small cell wireless system when a big network solution is not a viable business option."

GigXone Small Cells and Controllers (5 New Products)

The GigXone physical system is comprised of Carrier Cloud and HotZone controllers and a vast portfolio of GPS-enabled small form factor, multimode access points and backhaul products that can be deployed and mounted in a variety of options ranging from buildings, roofs, ceilings, walls, poles, light posts, as well as with BelAir Networks patented strand enclosures.

  • Carrier Cloud Controller (BelAirCC8000). The Carrier Controller was built with focus on scalability, wide area mobility, and carrier security. The BelAirCC8000 is deployed at the carrier's location and each controller can support up to 500 small cells.  With BelView, the controller-based system enables unprecedented network scalability to 100,000 small cells.  BelAirCC8000 manages wide area mobility between small cells via Mobile IP, L2VPN or GRE tunnels and supports standards based CAPWAP encrypted protocol and auto discovery of small cells, among other features.
  • HotZone Controller (BelAirHZ4000). The little brother to the Carrier Controller was developed as an in-deployment extension of the carrier's GigXone network.  BelAirHZ4000 is a premises based controller for ad-hoc and "hot zone" deployments of small cell "clusters" in areas such as stadiums, business and educational campuses, convention centers, malls and other high traffic enterprise locations. The BelAirHZ4000 is also well suited to manage and control clusters of small cells at one-time events and concerts where 10,000 to 100,000 people gather, providing a control point extension to the Carrier's core at the point of capacity consumption.
  • High-Performance Small Cells for Indoor, Outdoor, Campus and Stadiums.
    • BelAir1000 is a lower-cost small cell built for indoor deployments in locations frequented by the carrier's customers including retail, SMB, and campus environments.  BelAir1000 features POE (power over Ethernet) and "phones home" to the carrier network for ease of installation.  Advanced edge policy enforcement enables carriers to deliver a personalized user experience.  BelAir1000 also features integrated antennas, GPS for tracking and auto updates, and standards based beamforming for high performance networking in a sleek, discrete package.
    • BelAir1100 is a small form factor cell designed for outdoor coverage in stadium and campus networks.  The robust BelAir1100's plug and play features, and POE or 48V power, enable easy, one-step installation with no field commissioning required.  Just like the BelAir1000, it has integrated antennas, beamforming and GPS.
    • BelAir3200, the third generation strand-mount Cable Wi-Fi product, includes an integrated DOCSIS 3.0 8x4 cable modem with 8 bonded downstream channels delivering 240 Mbps of performance.   Fast and easy to install, BelAir3200 supports auto-configuration, electronic level control in up and downstream, and advanced powering and backhaul via existing cable plant.  Integrated GPS enables auto-location on BelView, making large-scale networks easier to manage.

GigXone Network Management

  • GigXone is powered by BelAirOS for traffic management, authentication, lawful intercept and other advanced features to give carriers the ability to conduct remote Radio Frequency engineering and management of the small cells.
  • BelAirBI Business Intelligence collects valuable network statistics, trends and usage information from within the carrier's own core network.
  • BelView is a robust network management system (NMS) for central provisioning, location identification and updates of GPS enabled GigXone small cells. With BelView, a carrier can manage one or many GigXone systems as part of the overall network.
  • BelAirVC Virtual Client provides a useful tool for field-testing of BelAir or any third-party individual small cell or overall system performance, using laptops, Android and/or iPhone smartphones.

Find more information, check out BelAir Networks GigXone, BelAirCC8000 Carrier Cloud Controller, BelAirHZ4000 HotZone Controller, BelAir1000, BelAir1100 and BelAir3200 on BelAir Networks website. BelAir Networks will feature the new GigXone system, controllers and small cells at booth # 546 at SCTE Cable-Tec 2011, Georgia World Congress Center, Atlanta, November 15 - 17, 2011 and at booth # A14 at Mobile Asia Congress, Hong Kong Convention Center, November 16 - 17, 2011.

About BelAir Networks

BelAir Networks is the leader in multimode small cell wireless systems for mobile and fixed carriers. BelAir Networks products are deployed by leading service providers such as AT&T, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Cablevision and Bright House Networks. The company's portfolio of indoor and outdoor small cells, control and management systems enable service providers to build scalable, high performance wireless networks to deliver Gig zone services. BelAir Networks is privately held with investments from Comcast Interactive Capital, T-Mobile Venture Fund and several leading venture capital firms, including Trilogy Equity Partners.

For more information, visit http://www.belairnetworks.com

DOCSIS® is a trademark of CableLabs. GigXone™ is a trademark of BelAir Networks.