Neul Ltd. (Cambridge, England), a company pioneering the use of spectrum allocated to television but not used locally, is joining a trial in South Africa being led by internet company Google to provide broadband access to ten schools in the Cape Town area. Neul and Google are being joined by Carlson Wireless Technologies Inc. (Arcata, Calif.), a developer of rugged wireless broadband systems.

Although Neul's primary interest in white-space radio to date has been to create networks for machine-to-machine (M2M) communications and the Internet of Things (IoT) the collaboration with Carlson offers the potential to improve Internet connectivity in the developing world.

The marriage of the RuralConnect system from Carlson Wireless and the Neul Horizon protocol the companies can offer point to multi-point sharing of Ethernet bandwidth data, the companies said.

Neul launched the first production TVWS radio equipment, NeulNet, in June 2011. It has worked with Carlson Wireless in numerous white-space trials around the world.

"TV white space offers an affordable alternative to both wired and cellular connections for under-reached communities," said Neil MacMullen, co-founder and vice president of software for Neul.

Luke Mckend, Google South Africa Country Manager, commented, "We are pleased to be part of this exciting new development - the first of its kind in South Africa - and look forward to opening discussions with policy makers around a regulatory framework that will support the wider use of TVWS to deliver wireless broadband Internet across the country."

By: DocMemory
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