Fusion Communications Corporation will begin field testing a wireless mesh network in January 2005 in the town of Osaki Kamijima, Hiroshima Prefecture, working with The Chugoku Electric Power Co., Inc. and Energia Communications Inc., a provider of FTTH (fiber optic) Internet service to the town.

 Fusion already provides IP telephone systems using wireless local area network (WLAN) technology within business establishments, but the added convenience to the customer of being able to use broadband and VoIP telephone services outdoors within the vicinity of the place of business via a wireless LAN has the potential of opening up new markets.

For outdoor use of a wireless LAN, it is necessary to cover the entire area where the wireless network is to be used. But with traditional WLAN technology, connections must be made through a backbone line that requires a base station antenna at each location. For this reason, extending wireless networks to outdoor areas has been costly, time-consuming, and problematic.

A wireless mesh network makes it possible to cover an entire area with a minimum number of backbone access points by allowing multiple wireless LAN base stations to connect to each other wirelessly. This minimizes the wiring work required for WLAN base stations, greatly reducing costs associated with a traditional wireless network and making the system easy to deploy.

In addition, the mesh network provides automatic optimization of the connection routes between the WLAN base stations. The backbone redundancy also makes the system robust and resistant to base station and wiring failures.

For the field testing, the wireless mesh network base stations are situated in the town of Osaki Kamijima, Hiroshima Prefecture, where an optical fiber (wired) broadband environment covers the entire district.

The purpose of carrying out various types of technical evaluation tests in the field is to clarify development issues for the future and to provide feedback toward commercializing various services including voice. Also, the empirical test results be gathered in regard to the provision of various types of services will be used to study the feasibility of future communications services.

Just as Internet provider services for the home are being replaced by high-speed, low-cost broadband access services such as ADSL and FTTH, the aim of this field testing is to expand broadband services in the outdoor environment, and is a way to verify possibilities for next-generation wireless LAN services.