Multipath data technology receives commercialization grant
Attila Technologies announced it has been awarded a $100,000 grant from the New Jersey Commission on Science and Technology that will help fund the commercialization of the startup company’s adaptive-radio technology.
Launched in July 2005 as a spin-off from the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, N.J., Attila Technologies has developed a patent-pending solution that lets a wireless user simultaneously use available bandwidth from multiple sources to transmit data packets, said Helena Wisniewski, Attila Technologies chairman and vice president of research and enterprise development for the Stevens Institute.
With Attila’s software-driven solution, a user with access to multiple wireless transmission paths — for instance, a private network, a public Wi-Fi network, a cellular network and a satellite network — can send some packets over each of these networks to deliver even large video files quickly, Wisniewski said. In addition, because the radio solution uses multiple networks, throughput is not degraded by network congestion or failure of a single network, so transmission reliability is greatly enhanced.
“Right now, we have a prototype version, and we’re doing some field tests,” Wisniewski said. “Our current radio is about the size of a 6-inch-thick laptop.”
Given this form factor and the technology’s characteristics, Wisniewski said that Attila plans to first target mobile applications for the public-safety market, which values reliability and redundancy in its communications. However, the company hopes to reduce the solution to a card or chip size so the technology can be used for consumer and enterprise applications.
While the technology has been tested, Attila officials are trying to establish a business model that will work for potential users, Wisniewski said. Maintaining connections with multiple service providers could become expensive quickly, particularly with many wireless plans charging on a per-minute basis.
“That’s something we’re still looking at,” she said.
