| 3/4/08 - Meshcom Technologies and Storm Semiconductor announced a partnership to roll out a total solution for Wi-Fi mesh access point designs. The solution consists of Storm Semiconductor's Gemini, a powerful dual core network processor, Meshcom's mesh technology and a complete reference design will be available to access point manufacturers in 1H/2008.
Installation, cabling and maintenance costs for network access are expensive in many environments. Meshcom has created a solution, Meshcom MeshDriver, to solve these problems. Meshcom MeshDriver is a layer 2.5 protocol stack with proven features of zero-configuration, self-resilience and an advanced routing algorithm. Storm Semiconductor's Gemini Dual Core Network Processor is now powered by Meshcom MeshDriver and is capable of supporting mesh networking without adding any additional hardware. Gemini incorporates two powerful ARM9 processors, with a dedicated hardware acceleration module called NetEngine for IPv4/v6 routing and forwarding, Layer 4 to Layer 7 packet inspection, filtering and classification, delivering a Gigabit WAN to LAN routing throughput, and wire-speed QoS performance. "Wireless mesh networking is a hot topic since it solves many networking issues in a very cost effective manner", said Miska Kaipiainen, CEO & Founder of Meshcom. "Today, consumers are being surrounded with new gadgets and appliances which all use difficult-to-configure network connections for services. Similarly, operators and WISPs need to offer services to the next billion people who live in rural or difficult-to-network areas. They stumble in creating profitable business since roll-out costs and maintenance for the networks are too high. We are very excited to work together with Storm Semiconductor because now we are able to create a solution that makes configuration trouble-free and allows operators to engage in more profitable business activities". "Gemini's dual CPU core with multiple Gigabit Ethernet interfaces and segregate PCI-to-CPU architecture makes it a unique and optimal solution for a dual band WiFi mesh network design," said Douglas Cheung, Sr. VP of Marketing and Operations of Storm. "Combined with the NetEngine, our customers will be able to build a high performance WiFi device that incorporates advanced features such as Network Address Translation, Firewall, and Quality of Service. Most importantly, for this joint solution, Storm's technology maximizes the potential of Meshcom's software in both performance and cost competitiveness for the whole eco-system." Keywords: broadband wireless, protocol stack, hardware acceleration, routing algorithm, wireless mesh networking, networking issues, network processor, hot topic, core network, wire speed, packet inspection, miska, reference design, maintenance costs, dual core, access point, mesh |
