Network connectivity solutions vendor B&B Electronics has launched a new Wi-Fi platform – AirborneM2M 802.11 a/b/g/n – on the secure, 2.4 GHz and 5GHz bands for mission-critical M2M networks.
The Airborne M2M portfolio of products is specially designed to enable integrators, VARs and OEMs to reduce the risk of obsolescence as enterprises upgrade their security policies and migrate their Wi-Fi infrastructure to the 5 GHz band, where up to 24 channels are available.
The 2.4 GHz band, which is reserved for industrial, scientific and medical services, is getting crowded and Wi-Fi only has access to three channels in that band.
B&B Electronics said it provides a full range of industrial Wi-Fi Access Points (APXN) and Wi-Fi Clients (ABDN), including Ethernet bridges, Ethernet routers and serial servers, which can seamlessly connect most equipment such as RS-232, 422, 485, Ethernet 10/100M and even I/O to the Wi-Fi network.
It added that Wi-Fi connectivity is ideal for mission-critical applications that need both Ethernet connectivity and wireless mobility, such as warehouse forklifts, mobile printers in car rental companies, and medical M2M solutions such as hospital patient monitoring systems and nurses stations.
Wi-Fi is steadily becoming a popular mode of communication within M2M due to the ease with which Wi-Fi-enabled devices are able to connect to a network with both wired and wireless segments.
Wi-Fi also sends data in high data-rate bursts, which ensures great battery life efficiency than other wireless protocols of M2M such as Bluetooth, ZigBee and BT-LE.
Besides featuring industrial strength packaging and a wide temperature rating (-40 to 85 C) to withstand challenging M2M environments, the AirborneM2M range is also able to handle processor-intensive advanced encryption techniques defined for enterprise-class security that are not available on entry-level Wi-Fi products.
This includes network security (EAP), wireless security (802.11i and WPA2-PSK), access security (authentication and firewalls), communication security (SSH) and device security (encryption).