History of Wireless LAN Vendors – Symbol Technologies at WLAN Book.com

November 6th, 2011

History of Wireless LAN Vendors – Symbol Technologies

by Zaib Kaleem

History of Wireless LAN Vendors – Symbol Technologies

Symbol Technologies started out as a handheld bar-code laser scanner company and entered the Wireless LAN market in 1990 with a proprietary WLAN product called Spectrum One and later 2.4 Ghz product line called Spectrum24. Info from Symbol’s 1996 website is below.

Spectrum One

Spread spectrum, one type of RF communication, was originally developed during World War II for government security. It resists interference and provides a common frequency for sharing among many users. After years of proprietary regulations, the FCC allocated the 902 to 928 MHz band for spread spectrum data communications in 1985. Offering up to two million bits per second, an immunity to interference, and no FCC site licensing requirements, spread spectrum has become a new standard for high speed RF data transmission.

Introduced by Symbol Technologies in 1990, Spectrum One® was the first spread spectrum communications technology to reach the market. A Spectrum One® RF network uses enhanced spread spectrum technology to meet users’ bar code-based data transmission requirements.

Spectrum24

Spectrum24, Symbol’s next-generation wireless LAN, is designed to provide a high level of performance. Its ease of installation, high throughput, expandable capacity and superior interference immunity make it ideal for applications where mobile communications and real-time data access are essential. Spectrum24 is a frequency hopping spread spectrum cellular network designed to operate within the 2.4 to 2.5 GHz bands around the world. This modulation technique provides a high capacity network by using multiple access points within large or small environments.

Controller Based WLANs

Towards the end of 2004 a “second generation architecture” was introduced that included managed access points and controllers / wireless switches.

WS2000

The WS2000 (“Wireless Switch 2000″) was very impressive for 2004. “Each WS 2000 supports up to six Access Ports and four wireless LANs, each with its own security and network policies. The plug-and-play Access Ports are ready to install right out of the box. Just attach directly to the WS 2000 or to your layer 2 LAN with Power-over-Ethernet and the network is immediately operational—LAN network integration is transparent. And upgrading to support newer standards in the future is fast and easy.”

WS5000

“The WS 5000 enables your wireless network to scale easily as your company grows, with a slim 1RU form factor that fits easily into any standard network equipment rack. Each WS 5000 supports up to 30 Access Ports and 32 WLANs.”

Access Points / Access Ports

Motorola Acquires Symbol in 2006

Motorola agrees to pay $3.9 billion in cash to acquire Symbol Technologies in 2006. In 2006 Motorola was the No. 2 manufacturer of wireless handsets after Nokia and was very interested in getting into the enterprise wireless business.