Motorola's Fixed Wireless Broadband Solutions Bring High-Speed Internet Connectivity to Hardee County

SCHAUMBURG, Ill., March 18 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- The Enterprise Mobility Solutions business of Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT) today announced that Rapid Systems, a wireless internet service provider and member of its channel program, was selected by the Hardee Broadband Project to deploy Motorola's fixed wireless broadband solutions across Hardee County, Fla. Based on Motorola's PTP 800 licensed microwave Ethernet bridges and PMP 320 licensed network access solutions, the wireless broadband infrastructure will deliver affordable, high-speed Internet connectivity to businesses and residents of the county.

"Anticipated changes in technology and the rapid growth in demand for high-speed Internet or data transfer capacity has put rural areas like Hardee County at a competitive disadvantage in today's global economy," said Bill Lambert, director, Hardee County Economic Development. "The wireless network solution from Motorola provides us with a compelling alternative to the outdated dial-up or DSL options currently available to our businesses and residents. When completed, this high-speed network will help our county extend affordable Internet connectivity to our residents and help local businesses reduce their operating costs by replacing expensive T1 leased lines with wireless broadband technology."

Today, Internet service/data volume and speed in Hardee County are limited to capacities available through conventional telephone technologies, with much of the county's rural areas limited to "dial-up" speeds of 56K and more urbanized communities having access to low-end DSL service. The Hardee Broadband Project has emerged as a result of the Federal stimulus focus on bringing broadband services to rural communities. Specifically, the Hardee County Economic Development Authority has provided a grant to fund the infrastructure for a wireless broadband system that relies on Motorola's fixed wireless broadband equipment and technology.  

"The superior non line-of-sight performance of Motorola's PMP 320 solution helped us significantly reduce the deployment time and cost by installing less equipment," said Dustin Jurman, chief executive officer, Rapid Systems. "The Adaptive Modulation feature of Motorola's PTP 800 set the radio apart from other licensed microwave solutions. Its ability to change the modulations and throughput speeds automatically when link conditions change was a deciding factor in selecting Motorola's licensed microwave Ethernet bridges."

The Hardee County project will use licensed microwave originating from tower sites in the Riverview Florida area, the South Lakeland Florida area and, possibly, the SR64 area of Manatee County. The solution recommended by Rapid Systems will leverage Motorola's highly scalable PTP 800 licensed microwave Ethernet bridges to backhaul client Internet traffic from two central points and distribute data to 14 concrete poll tower sites at pre-engineered locations throughout the County. Together, these sites will be providing access to broadband service throughout the County to residential and commercial "last mile" users via Motorola's PMP 320 wireless broadband network access solutions operating in the licensed 802.16e standard.

"The licensed PTP 800 and WiMAX-interoperable PMP 320 wireless broadband solutions provide network operators and their customers with vastly increased throughput per investment dollar, enabling operators to extend affordable, secure and reliable connectivity without sacrificing performance," said Scott French, MSSI vice president Wireless Mobility Solutions, Motorola Enterprise Mobility Solutions. "Motorola is at the forefront of innovation in wireless broadband and is focused on providing our partners and customers with solutions that help transform their communities and stimulate economic development."

For more information regarding the Hardee County Broadband Project, contact the local Economic Development Office at (863) 773-3030, Chamber of Commerce at (863) 773-6967, or visit www.rapidsys.com.

Motorola delivers seamless connectivity that puts real-time information in the hands of users, which gives customers the agility they need to grow their business or better serve and protect the public. Working seamlessly together with its world-class devices, Motorola's unrivaled wireless network solutions include indoor wireless LAN, outdoor wireless mesh, point-to-multipoint, point-to-point networks and voice-over-WLAN solutions. Combined with powerful software tools for wireless network design, best-of-breed security, management and troubleshooting, Motorola's solutions deliver trusted networking and access anywhere to organizations across the globe.

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About Motorola

Motorola is known around the world for innovation in communications and is focused on advancing the way the world connects. From broadband communications infrastructure, enterprise mobility and public safety solutions to high-definition video and mobile devices, Motorola is leading the next wave of innovations that enable people, enterprises and governments to be more connected and more mobile. Motorola (NYSE: MOT) had sales of US $22 billion in 2009. For more information, please visit www.motorola.com.

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SOURCE Motorola, Inc.