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OFDM Forum Draws Over
150 Attendees
to Work on IEEE 802.16 Standard for
Global Broadband Wireless Standard
BEIJING, China, April 11, 2002 - The OFDM Forum, a market development association established to promote a single, compatible global Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) standard for cost-effective, high-speed wireless networks, held its Annual General Meeting in Beijing, China, April 8th to 9th, 2002. More that 150 attendees were present, including government and academic institutions, telecommunications carriers, internet service providers, wireless equipment manufacturers and others. The meeting featured ten presentations, of which Chinese participants gave six. OFDM Forum membership in the Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (Wi-MAX) Forum was approved; Ramez Gerges of the Testbed Centre For Interoperability (TCFI) received the Sustained Research Award; and Wi-LAN Inc., Ramez Gerges and Philip Barber were elected as the new working group chairs.
"We were very pleased to host the OFDM Forum's 2002 Annual Meeting here in Beijing," said Mr.Lin Jinquan, Chairman of the China Institute of Communications (CIC) and Former Vice Minister of the China Ministry of Information Industry (MII). "The meeting was very informative and generated much interest among Chinese wireless telecommunications companies and officials.
We hope that the OFDM Forum will consider having future meetings here so that we can accelerate the momentum that this meeting has started."
The OFDM Forum membership voted to join the Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (Wi-MAX) Forum. Wi-MAX has been established to promote the IEEE 802.16 standard for wireless networking as a global broadband wireless standard and to promote equipment interoperability and compatibility under the IEEE 802.16 standard. The OFDM Forum will undertake to define the testing and interoperability profile for the emerging IEEE 802.16a standard for broadband wireless wide area networks in the under 11 GHz radio frequencies.
"We are very excited to be joining the Wi-MAX Forum," said Mr. Peter Nurse, Executive Director of the OFDM Forum. "This is an excellent opportunity for our members to participate in implementation of the IEEE 802.16a standard and potentially benefit from Wi-MAX's target of defining one price tag for patents related to the IEEE802.16 standards."
Several organizational changes were made at the meeting. The Wireless Local Area Network, Personal Area Network and Home Multimedia Working Group and the Broadband Mobile Wireless (formerly Wireless Road Access) Working Group were merged to form the new Broadband Mobile Wireless (BMW) Working Group. This group will focus on the promotion and development of OFDM as the technology of choice for Fourth Generation (4G) mobile applications. Ramez Gerges of the Testbed Center for Interoperability (TCFI) was elected along with Philip Barber, formerly of 4G Network Technologies, to co-chair the BMW Working Group, and Wi-LAN Inc. (TSE:WIN) was elected as chair company of the Fixed Wireless Access Working Group. A steering committee meeting of the principal members to elect a chair and vice-chair company of the Forum was deferred because a quorum of principal members was not present.
The Forum also instituted an annual Sustained Research Award to recognize outstanding efforts in promoting OFDM as a standard. The 2002 Award was granted to Ramez Gerges for his efforts to promote a single standard for Broadband Mobile Wireless Intelligent Transportation System applications. The Intelligent Transportation System-Radio Services (ITS-RS) standard uses OFDM technology and is expected to accelerate the realization of seamless connectivity in the areas of ITS, Telematics, and Homeland Security. Mr. Gerges is the Principal Engineer at the TCFI, a founding member of the OFDM Forum.
The meeting was sponsored by the CIC, the OFDM Forum, Netro Corporation, Wi-Comm Communications Inc. and Yokogawa Electric Company. The MII approved the meeting, and it was supported by Beijing University of Post and Telecommunications.
Presentations given at the meeting will be posted on the OFDM Forum's website at www.ofdm-forum.com, depending on availability and permission of the presenters.
About The
OFDM Forum
The OFDM Forum is a market development association
comprised of hardware manufacturers, software firms, telecommunications
companies and other users interested in Orthogonal Frequency Division
Multiplexing (OFDM) technology in wireless applications. Founded in December
1999, the OFDM Forum was established to promote a single, compatible global OFDM
standard for cost-effective, high-speed wireless networks on a variety of
devices. Founding companies are: Ericsson, Nokia, Philips Semiconductors,
Samsung Electro-Mechanics, Sony, Wi-LAN and the Testbed Center for
Interoperability at the University of California at Santa Barbara (a division of
CalTrans). The OFDM Forum has grown to include over 50 members to date, 10 of
which are listed as Principal Members of the organization.
# # #
CONTACT:
OFDM Forum
Janice
Keenan, 403/207-6309
Email: jkeenan@ofdm-forum.com
or
Wi-LAN
Inc.
Ken
Wetherell, 403/207-6329
Email: media@wi-lan.com