London, UK, June 20, 2007 - BT iNET, the LAN & IP telephony solutions specialist, today announced a new agreement with Extricom, which will see the company's award-winning Interference-Free™ Enterprise Wireless LAN System incorporated into BT's wireless and mobility convergence solutions.

The first joint customer to benefit is Bishop's Stortford College in Hertfordshire, where BT iNET designed and deployed a wireless network, using Extricom's Wireless LAN (WLAN) system at its core, to cover pupil boarding houses located on the 130-acre campus of the independent school, which caters for girls and boys aged four to 18. The wireless solution provides complete coverage using multiple Wi-Fi channel blankets spanning the site's buildings, enabling a fully converged deployment for carrying real time voice, data, and video. This unique next-generation wireless system delivers seamless, handoff-free user mobility and guaranteed bandwidth, without the channel density or interference constraints common to other Wi-Fi deployments.

Stephen Bacon, head of information technology at the College, said: "We were looking to significantly extend our existing wireless provision and so the new solution needed to be easy for us to deploy and manage, yet still attain the superior performance required by today's connected students.

"The BT/Extricom solution provided just that. Pupils and staff are now benefiting from a resilient, high-performance wireless infrastructure, which is also easy to manage. It has been a win-win solution for both user and administrator."

Neil Pemberton, managing director, BT iNet, said: "Organisations are mobilising their workforce and processes at an accelerating rate. In the past, wireless computing was reserved for a select few and for limited areas of the enterprise. Now, we are seeing organisations adopt wireless technology as a pervasive, strategic asset. By joining forces with Extricom, BT iNet is driving the availability of reliable wireless connectivity, which can support an ever-broadening set of uses, such as voice, ubiquitous data connectivity, location services, and even streaming video. Working together we will identify and leverage the right advanced technologies that will yield the type of infrastructure that can meet these heightened expectations."

Extricom's patented Interference-Free WLAN System represents the next generation of enterprise Wi-Fi, with a fundamental shift in architecture, from "cell-planning" to a "channel blanket" layout. This eliminates the co-channel interference that plagues traditional WLAN systems, to deliver seamless mobility, ‘wire-like' connections, greatly increased capacity, and guaranteed levels of connectivity for all users. All without the error-prone and costly RF cell-planning of traditional solutions. The result is a high-performance yet simple solution for powering the enterprise triple play of data, voice (VoWLAN) and video.

Gideon Rottem, CEO of Extricom, said: "VoIP's (voice over IP) disruptive effect in the telephony field is undeniable. The Extricom WLAN seeks to be equally disruptive in the enterprise WLAN arena, and voice over Wi-Fi is the trigger for such disruption. Voice and location applications demand mobility, and this is the first system to bring total and seamless mobility to Wi-Fi, while also enhancing all other facets of performance such as coverage, capacity, and security, all of which are necessary for the enterprise wireless triple play."

"BT iNet maintains an impressive array of capabilities and expertise in converged wireless, and is well positioned to deliver the kinds of advanced and high-value infrastructure solutions that are an ideal fit for Extricom's WLAN architecture."

Click here to download an Extricom case study of the Bishop's Stortford College WLAN deployment. 

About BT iNET

BT iNet is the leading provider of Cisco-based LAN & IPT solutions, applications and Managed Services that helps you profit from convergence via tailored LAN-centric IT services. The experience, flexibility and responsiveness of BT iNet's organization, and its focus on understanding your business, enable it to design and deliver truly integrated IT services, so that you can maximize the efficiencies and cost savings that convergence brings to business for today and tomorrow. As a subsidiary of BT, BT iNet can offer significant support, including field resource and remote management capabilities to enhance your corporate networks. Enquiries: www.bt.com/btinet Tel: 01691 664055.

About BT

BT is one of the world's leading providers of communications solutions and services operating in 170 countries. Its principal activities include networked IT services; local, national and international telecommunications services; higher-value broadband and internet products and services and converged fixed/mobile products and services. BT consists principally of four lines of business: BT Global Services, Openreach, BT Retail and BT Wholesale.

In the year ended 31 March 2007, BT Group plc's revenue was £20,223 million with profit before taxation of £2,484 million.

British Telecommunications plc (BT) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of BT Group and encompasses virtually all businesses and assets of the BT Group. BT Group plc is listed on stock exchanges in London and New York.

For more information, visit www.bt.com/aboutbt