Broadband Wireless Pioneers Wi-LAN and Radionet Form Global Strategic Alliance

Business Wire, Sept 29, 2004

CALGARY, Canada & HELSINKI, Finland -- Wi-LAN Inc. (TSX:WIN):

Wi-LAN's Pre-WiMAX Products Combined with Radionet's Wi-Fi Hotzone Solutions Provide Affordable City-Wide Mobile Broadband Access

Wi-LAN Inc. (TSX:WIN), a global provider of broadband wireless communications products and technologies and a charter member of the WiMAX Forum(1), and Radionet, a leading supplier of Wi-Fi Hotzone technology, today announced the formation of a global sales and marketing alliance to jointly market end-to-end broadband wireless solutions that combine Wi-LAN's pre-WiMAX Libra products with Radionet's Wi-Fi Hotzone solutions. Under the terms of the alliance, the two companies will cooperate on joint sales and marketing, and the alliance enables the companies to deliver Wireless Hotzone solutions to customers globally.

The combination of Wi-LAN's high-speed backbone wireless equipment and Radionet's outdoor Wi-Fi end-user solutions enables complete coverage of service areas, including differentiated quality of service, instant access for visiting users and mobile roaming capabilities, for private households, business enterprises and large corporate customers. Wi-LAN's Libra products provide the high-capacity non-line-of-sight capabilities that are needed for Hotzone backhaul and for large customers who require a large amount of dedicated bandwidth. Radionet's outdoor Hotzone equipment provides users with ubiquitous broadband Wi-Fi access within the coverage area, including roaming, with speeds up to 54 megabits-per-second.

"The hybrid Wi-Fi and pre-WiMAX architecture of the Radionet and Wi-LAN solution is fundamentally sound and profitable," said Dr. Sayed-Amr El-Hamamsy, President and CEO, Wi-LAN Inc. "The last kilometer employs beefed-up outdoor Wi-Fi base stations, which transform each Wi-Fi hot spot into a Hotzone, extending the range from the 50 to 100 meter radius of a typical Wi-Fi hot spot up to approximately one kilometer. Also, Radionet's base station equipment enables seamless roaming between different Hotzones. The Hotzones are backhauled by Wi-LAN's Libra 3000 product. Additionally, for large customers where a high level of quality of service and guaranteed data rates are required we place a Libra 3000 unit at the customer site. In these cases the revenue per customer easily justifies the cost of the equipment. We now have the promise of broadband wireless access anywhere, anytime and at a very affordable price."

Under the alliance, Wi-LAN will deliver Radionet's products globally through its direct sales and channel networks, and Radionet will deliver Wi-LAN's products through its partner network in Europe. The companies will also carry out joint marketing activities and expect to engage in joint product development.

"As the wireless industry is preparing for WiMAX, Radionet and Wi-LAN are uniquely positioned at the forefront and can together deliver on many of the promises of WiMAX already today. With the combination of Wi-LAN and Radionet technology, operators can quickly and cost-effectively bring seamless broadband wireless access to large areas as well as remote locations", said Radionet's CEO Robert Seren. "In addition to this, the alliance with Wi-LAN further strengthens Radionet's market presence and opens up whole new markets in North and South America as well as Asia and the Pacific region."

Established in 1992, Wi-LAN has been selling commercial broadband wireless equipment since 1995, expects to be the first company to deliver WiMAX Certified(1) equipment in 2005, and has introduced its CONTINUITY PROGRAM(TM), which is Wi-LAN's commitment that its current Libra Customer Premise Equipment (CPE) will operate side by side, in the same network, the same cell and even the same sector with future WiMAX Certified CPE's. Radionet has pioneered several key Wi-Fi Hotzone inventions such as seamless mobility within the networks and roaming between different operators. Together the two companies have successfully deployed several networks in the Nordic countries, including Europe's largest Wi-Fi Hotzone Network, Wivanet in Vantaa, Finland. These networks feature a unique combination of licensed and license-exempt technologies by utilizing Wi-LAN's high-capacity broadband wireless equipment for backhaul connections and Radionet's outdoor Wi-Fi equipment for end-user access.

The structure of the network makes it easy to deploy, benefiting from the non-line-of-sight capability of Wi-LAN's pre-Wi-MAX Libra equipment to backhaul the Wi-Fi Hotzones. The capacity of the Libra equipment means that there is no restriction of the overall throughput, as happens in cases where the backhaul of Wi-Fi is done through DSL or cable with their limited bandwidth. Because the last kilometer access is provided by Wi-Fi systems, the cost of equipment is divided amongst a large number of individual customers, and therefore the revenue per unit is high enough to ensure the profitability of the network. The network has the inherent mobility advantage of wireless, which cannot be matched by any of the landline methods. Furthermore, the cost of ownership for the end customers is lower because they do not need to purchase their own Wi-Fi access point or router and they are connected to the network anytime, anywhere with their Wi-Fi enabled laptop or PDA. Thus the economic challenge of most broadband networks, providing profitable differentiated service to the individual residential customer, has been resolved.