Firetide, a developer of wireless mesh networks, today announced that Ray Cammack Shows (RCS), one of the largest carnival midway companies in North America with 9 million annual visitors, has successfully deployed a Firetide network.
The Firetide network supports the entire operation of the enterprise, including real-time eTicketing, inventory management, and time card tracking for over 500 full-time and temporary employees.
Managing a fleet of over 80 trucks, RCS is a self-contained mobile entertainment company. The RCS “traveling” wireless infrastructure includes 46 Firetide nodes, 35 access points, and over 300 hand-held cordless scanners and POS terminals. Data from the scanners, including ticket redemptions, time card logs, and inventory levels in each game booth are communicated in real-time to the operations center, enabling immediate response.
RCS embarked on a business reengineering initiative in 2006 with the goal to implement a completely “digital” midway to deter ticket fraud, reduce paper waste, and optimize inventory and personnel management. RCS needed a secure infrastructure that could be rapidly deployed and perform in any environment that its IT team faced.
The RCS IT team has protocols in place to deal with unexpected challenges, such as interference that impacts communications between access points and scanners. The Firetide backbone, however, has been the most resilient part of the wireless network: operating at 5 GHz, it is the component least susceptible to interference from common Wi-Fi devices that operate at 2.4 GHz.
Firetide HotPort mesh nodes and access points support video surveillance, Internet access, public safety networks, and temporary networks wherever rapid deployment, mobility, and ease of installation are required.
Meanwhile, a consortium led by Motorola provided voice, data, video and images – for the Pan American Games, held in Río de Janeiro, Brazil. The communications infrastructure will be left for city use after the games are completed.
Motorola deployed a wireless security system in more than 60 sites throughout the city using Motorola’s MOTOMESH Duo network, and Canopy point-to point and point-to-multipoint high-speed wireless systems. A control and command system consolidated images received from numerous cameras across the city of Río.
The HC700, a PDA equipped with Microsoft Office Communicator Mobile addressed the demands of mobile workers across the city.
Brazilian GSM operator TIM Brazil, said telecom regulator Anatel should no longer delay the auction of WiMAX spectrum. They plan to invest US$1 billion this year in spectrum acquisition and network construction for WiMAX and 3G, with investments from the Brazilian subsidiary of Telecom Italia.
According to Clearwire executive VP Scott Richardson:
“3G is defined by its legacy, which is the evolution of the cellular industry and building a network that has evolved from voice. WiMAX is very much a pure-play mobile Internet standard defined for packet-based communications. WiMAX has roughly four times the performance of 3G technologies on average at roughly one-tenth the cost per packet delivered”.
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