Canadian licence-exempt players divided over impact of FCC ruling on 2.4 GHz

Industry players offering service in the licence-exempt 2.4 GHz band are divided over what effect a recent Federal Communications Commission (FCC) ruling will have in this country. The decision, which gives more bandwidth to proponents of HomeRF technology, also raises concerns of increased interference and congestion in the unlicensed band. The U.S. ruling could have serious ramifications for such high-profile Canadian companies as Wi-LAN Inc and WaveRider Communications Inc, which use competing technology based on direct sequence spread spectrum (DSSS). While some opponents of the HomeRF or frequency hopping technology fear that the 2.4 GHz band will now become overtaxed by traffic, others predict graver consequences. "The FCC has just signed in essence the death warrant for the 2.4 GHz band," says Hatim Zaghloul, chair/CEO at Calgary-based Wi-LAN. He adds that congestion in the band will only get worse with emerging Bluetooth-enabled devices and new devices that will be HomeRF-like. "It was already bad enough trying to co-exist with the microwave oven." While it is still unclear what the potential effects will be here in Canada and in the rest of North America, the impact elsewhere could be extensive. In Europe, Zaghloul notes that some of his company’s installations "are like threading needles." For its part, the Radio Advisory Board of Canada (RABC) isn’t able to take an indepth look at the issue. Ted Campbell, executive director at the RABC, told Report on Wireless that it’s impossible for the board to comment on any possible ramifications when not all the players involved are at the table. He says the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association is currently trying to contact smaller companies that use the unlicensed band. Once that happens, then the board will be better able to take a more comprehensive look at the FCC ruling and its impact on Canadian spectrum policy. While the Wi-LAN chair doesn’t fear an imminent competitive threat from makers of equipment based on HomeRF technology, he admits that the decision is a blow to 802.11b – the IEEE standard on which the company’s products are designed. "I see there could be an impact on future sales," he says, "because the 10-20 million units that are forecasted for next year will be sold and they will unfortunately suffer some interference," says Zaghloul. The decision increases the usability of frequency hopping products, by enabling them to increase data rates from 2 Mbs to up to 10 Mbs. This, say proponents of the HomeRF technology, will allow products based on this technology to reach speeds comparable to those from DSSS-based products providing a much healthier competitive environment. However, Zaghloul still contends that direct sequence-based products are far better than any type of device that will be developed as a result of this ruling. "There is no doubt that from a speed stand point, (the FCC ruling) has not affected the DSSS crown, nor the OFDM (orthogonal frequency division multiplexing) throne," he confidently states. It should be noted, however, that the FCC recently turned down a Wi-LAN application asking the U.S. regulatory body to certify its OFDM-based systems for the unlicensed 2.4 GHz band. The company said in a statement that it is appealing the ruling, and doesn’t expect this most recent decision to have a "significant impact on Wi-LAN’s overall business objectives moving forward." While Zaghloul was quite emphatic in his opposition to the ruling, executives at WaveRider Communications didn’t seem too threatened by the effect of the decision, saying that co-habitation of the competing technologies is possible. Charles Brown, VP marketing at WaveRider says the decision’s impact on the company’s business will be minimal. Although the company uses competing technology, its products are designed for outdoor wireless wide area networks and HomeRF-based equipment is ideally suited for indoor wireless LANs. Brown also doubts that the potential wider use of HomeRF systems will cause incompatibility issues. He cites the company’s LMS series of products, which can connect up to 420 businesses on the system running at about 7 Mbs. He says they won’t experience any interference from the indoor LAN. "Those systems have an external antenna that is directional-based and won’t pick up any interference from in-office wireless LAN type of equipment," he told RoW. The interference which may occur between the competing systems shouldn’t be much of a problem anyway, Brown says. While the FCC gave more bandwidth to HomeRF systems to send traffic, it also mandated that the power output for these systems cannot exceed 125 mW. "In fact, from our view, what happens to frequency hopping is it will result in fewer channels and lower output power for those products and that actually makes them less suitable for outdoor use," he explains. While there won’t be too much of an impact on WaveRider operations, Brown does foresee some increased competition to those DSSS players that offer products for indoor wireless LANs. With HomeRF equipment now capable of reaching speeds of 10 Mbs, it does put some added pressure on companies using the DSSS technology, he says. The frequency hopping players can now make a better case for their products by saying they can reach comparable speeds and are more robust.

Canadian licence-exempt players divided over impact of FCC ruling on 2.4 GHz

News | September 18, 2000

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