First Fully Embedded Network Management for FSO Equipment to be Integrated into SONAbeam Product Line

Hannover Germany and Vancouver, Canada – 12 March 2003 - fSONA Communications, designer and manufacturer of the award-winning SONAbeam™ optical wireless transmission equipment, announced today at CeBIT the introduction of a fully integrated and embedded network management system for the SONAbeam™ FSO product line.

fSONA’s new Integrated Network Management (INM) provides network operations personnel with unprecedented control and monitoring of their FSO equipment via a directly IP addressable connection to the SONAbeam™ embedded processor. Carrier customers as well as emerging and progressive service providers managing evolving or large scale deployments of FSO systems will find the integrated network management features in fSONA’s INM essential.

“Due to their strict quality of service standards, carriers need constant access to monitoring and management of each element on their network,” states fSONA’s President & CEO, Theresa Carbonneau. “Our carrier customers have told us that in order to deploy large-scale FSO networks, they require comprehensive network management features to be integrated directly into the FSO equipment.”

SONAbeam™ Integrated Network Management (INM) allows network engineers to assign an IP address to each terminal for monitoring and management over the Internet. In addition, each terminal keeps internal logs of fundamental performance parameters such as received signal strength, clock recovery status, and transmitter output power, as well as internal temperatures and assorted diagnostics, without the need for an external PC. Advanced troubleshooting is provided through internal loop-back capability for both the near and far ends, which allows technical personnel to check the operation of a link at different stages along the data path for more efficient installation and performance assessment. The proprietary software included with each SONAbeam™ for monitoring and control of each terminal has also been upgraded with an enhanced graphical user interface that is highly intuitive.

In addition to the standard features that are included with every SONAbeam™, the new management program offers two options. A fully embedded SNMP agent (i.e. no external proxy box required) is offered for management of multiple network devices. And ‘Far End Terminal Management’ allows the network manager to access monitoring information through the Free Space Optical link itself. This means that a network manager need only connect one side of a link (via RS232 or IP address) to the network to access both the near and far end terminals.

About fSONA
fSONA Systems is recognized as the preferred provider of optical wireless solutions for government, enterprise and service provider markets around the globe. Leveraging leading edge advancements in 1550nm optical transmission, the SONAbeam™ family of systems, based on free-space-optics (FSO), use a globally unlicensed, wireless technology to provide speeds up to 2.5 Gbps over distances up to 7km. For more information visit www.fsona.com or www.free-space-optics.org

Further Information
For more information about fSONA, SONAbeam or Free-Space Optical Wireless, please contact:

604-273-6333
media@fsona.com

fSONA and SONAbeam® are trademarks of fSONA Networks. All other trademarks are properties of their respective companies.