Short-Range High Data Rate Mobile Wireless Communications System

Mayflower Communications Company, Inc.'s (Mayflower) Phase I proposal is responsive to the Army STTR Program objective to develop and demonstrate high data rate, short distance mobile wireless communications system which would allow the transfer of 100'sof Mbps in a range of 50-100 feet from mobile base stations to combat vehicles and dismounted soldiers. Mayflower's proposed Mobile Data Communications System (MDCS) builds on the work being performed at our research partner (WINLAB, Rutgers, The StateUniversity of New Jersey) on the Infostation Concept and our work for the Air Force and MDA for high data rate, secure range Telemetry and TSPI system. The MDCS proposal modifies and adapts the Infostation concept, as needed, to meet the Army's FutureCombat System (FCS) program requirements. The MDCS system architecture augments the Infostation radio concept with adaptive (Smart ) antenna to further increase capacity, and consequently, the data rate. The Phase I study will perform trade-off analysesto define the physical layer (the radio air interface) and upper layer protocols and recommend a MDCS system design and architecture that will be prototyped and demonstrated in the follow-on Phase II program. The proposed MDCS architecture will, ideally,fit well with the Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS), providing for software defined control of the radio-link. The Infostation radio (and network) concept of dispersed data islands, trading off ubiquitous coverage for increased data rate, is an emergingnew concept to transfer large amounts of data in a mobile wireless data application. The military market for this technology, after it has been demonstrated in a Phase II program, could lead to several thousands of mobile units per year in production.The Infostation concept is one of the few candidates being considered for the commercial, so-called fourth generation (4G), standards. Depending on the market success of the current commercial 3G wireless technology and standards, the 4G technology'smarket share is expected to be in hundreds of million dollars to a few billion dollars for the radio equipment.