LOS GATOS, CA /PRNewswire/ -- Firetide Inc., a developer of wireless multi-service mesh technology, announced that Korea's KT Corp. (KT) has successfully completed the first phase of installing the company's mesh technology covering portions of Jeju and Woo islands off the southern coast of Korea. The mesh network spans a large geographical area, covering 204 square kilometers, or 80 square miles, and replaces a legacy network provided by KT for the Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA) to monitor weather systems in the region. The mesh networks provide a fully wireless infrastructure that connects remote weather forecasting equipment and video cameras to the KMA's network.
"Mesh networks are the ideal solution for connecting outdoor weather sensors to the main KMA network because they can be used over large geographies, including land and water," said Dr. Hyung-Kuen Ryu, PhD., Project Manager of KT Future Technology Laboratory's Next Generation Internet Research Division. "The Firetide mesh makes it easy to deploy network coverage for outlying islands and coastal areas, where network cabling would be very difficult, time-consuming, and expensive to install. It also provides much better performance and coverage than our legacy networks. The ability of the Firetide mesh to operate around line-of-sight obstacles and maintain high performance has allowed us to successfully backhaul weather sensors network at locations that are geographically 15 km to 20 km away. This is very impressive."
The mesh network connects ubiquitous sensor network equipment on Jeju and Woo islands that monitor climate trends for researchers and maintains early warnings for Korean islanders during dangerous weather conditions. The Firetide system consists of small devices called mesh nodes that automatically link to each other to form the wireless network. Each Firetide mesh node has multiple Ethernet ports that allow any wired networking device, including video cameras and weather sensors, to operate wirelessly over the mesh without modification or additional configuration.
"This project demonstrates the feasibility of using mesh networks for innovative and challenging networking applications virtually anywhere," said Bo Larsson, CEO of Firetide. "By providing a reliable and cost-effective Ethernet solution for remote outdoor areas, KT and KMA can easily expand their data collection capabilities to enhance both scientific research and public safety. With the implementation of mesh, KT can also extend the network for other applications, such as video monitoring of forest fires and providing low-cost mobile voice over IP services to remote areas and offshore locations."
For more information about Firetide, visit the company's Web site. For more information about KT Corp., visit their Web site.
About Firetide Inc.
Firetide is a leading provider of multi-service mesh networks that enable concurrent video, voice, and data for municipal, public safety, and enterprise applications. Firetide HotPort mesh nodes and HotPoint access points provide a reliable, high-performance wireless infrastructure and access solution for video surveillance, Internet access, public safety networks, and temporary networks wherever rapid deployment, mobility, and easy of installation are required. The company's patented AutoMesh flow-based routing protocol optimizes network performance and capacity for high-bandwidth and latency-sensitive applications. Headquartered in Los Gatos, CA, Firetide is a privately held company with worldwide product distribution. For more information, visit the company's Web site.
Firetide and Multi-Service Mesh Networks are trademarks of Firetide Inc.
About KT Corp.
The KT Corp. (KT) is Korea's leading telephone service provider with nationwide coverage for fixed-line communication networks and over 20 million subscribers. KT became a high-speed Internet provider in 1999 and just one year later, in June 2000, the company seized the number one position in this market. This was followed by a landmark achievement in September 2000, when KT subscribers surpassed the 1 million mark, the highest number ever reached among local telecom players. KT established itself as one of the world's best broadband service providers when its number of subscribers grew to 4 million by March 2002 and 5 million by January 2003. KT launched Commercial WiBro (wireless broadband) service in Korea on June 30, 2006. For more information, visit the company's Web site.