Foxcom Wireless reinvents itself.

(From Israel Business Arena)

Byline: Gilad Nass

Wireless networks providers are expanding their business by focusing placing signal enhancement and distribution systems in key locations to enable opportunistic users to surf from public places. Meanwhile, the large market for office wireless networks stood shamefacedly on the sidelines. Long before we knew that someday we would surf the wireless web from a caf', company IT managers were searching for a way to give employees wireless mobility within buildings. The search began in factories, but later spread to offices, university campuses, hospitals, and elsewhere.

Ostensibly, placing wireless base stations in strategic locations ought to give them the necessary range, but it turned out that the installation costs for multi-storey buildings was immense, because the base stations could not transmit between floors.

The solution was derived from longstanding cellular operations: an office distribution system for cellular signals received from an external antenna. Companies offered this service to enable cellular calls within buildings, and it turns out that the concept can also be applied to wireless networks.

Foxcom Wireless was spun off from Jerusalem start-up Foxcom (now a division of OnePath Networks) in 1998. Foxcom develops and markets fiber optic solutions for the professional satellite, broadcast, and MDU (multi-dwelling unit) markets.

A fiber …