Former Cymbolic Engineering Manager to Direct Manufacturing for Optical Wireless Firm

Richmond, Canada - October 04, 2000 - In a major step toward full commercial production, fSONA Communications Corporation - a maker of broadband optical wireless systems for high-speed communications - has named Derek Montgomery as director of manufacturing.

Montgomery brings to fSONA an extensive background in engineering and manufacturing within the field of optics technology. In his new position with fSONA, he will direct the company's Canadian manufacturing operations, including production, materials management and quality assurance.

"By bringing Derek onto the fSONA team, we have taken another major step forward in our manufacturing process," said Theresa Carbonneau, president and chief executive officer of the company that is leading the development of broadband optical wireless systems for high-speed Internet access and LAN-to-LAN (local area network) communications. "We are on track to meet our initial production objectives this year, and to scale up to full commercial production early next year."

Founded in 1997, fSONA has an exclusive license from British Telecom for optical laser-based systems that provide wireless communications for broadband services at gigabit speeds. In its Los Angeles, California-based research and development center, fSONA developed a family of optical wireless products to meet the rising global demand for inexpensive computer-to-computer and Internet connections in metropolitan areas where wired technology is either unavailable or too costly to install.

The SONAbeam™ product line carries high volumes of digital information - voice, data and video - at up to 1.25 gigabits per second between transceiver terminals as far apart as four kilometers, delivering broadband communications at a fraction of the cost of wired technologies. To oversee full-scale production, Montgomery has joined fSONA from Cymbolic Sciences International, a British Columbia-based maker of digital imaging products. At Cymbolic, Montgomery served as manufacturing engineering manager and also held various positions in engineering and service.

Before Cymbolic, Montgomery was an independent consultant in optical technology, as well as an optics system design engineer with MacDonald, Dettwiler & Assoc. He holds three patents in optics technology and is a member of the Society of Photo-optical Instrumentation Engineers (S.P.I.E.).

He also holds a Bachelor of Engineering Physics degree from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, where he specialized in optical technology.

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.