Proxim Wireless (News - Alert) believes that standards can unnecessarily water down solutions by diluting their efficiency, but the company appears to be embracing the idea of LTE nonetheless. That’s not to say the company is using LTE (News - Alert) in its products, however. It isn’t. Rather, Proxim is offering up its proprietary products to enable mobile data backhaul in LTE-based networks.

Lee Gopadze, CEO of Proxim Wireless, notes that mobile data backhaul requirements in LTE networks are different than those in existing cellular networks. That’s because the new 4G infrastructure will be much more distributed, with a makeup of many smaller cell sites rather than fewer great big ones. Some of those cell sites, he adds, will be located on flag poles and other settings that call for lightweight radios and lightweight backhaul solutions. Because the cell sites will be more far flung, he adds, there’s also a need for point-to-multipoint (rather than just point-to-point) mobile backhaul solutions. Proxim believes it is well positioned to provide wireless network operators with such solutions.

Proxim also is looking to grow its business by targeting remote learning, telemedicine and video surveillance opportunities abroad, says Gopadze, who mentioned China’s interest in video surveillance. The Wall Street Journal earlier this month reported that China, already a big user of video surveillance solutions, is now building a sophisticated new system of this type that will include up to 500,000 cameras. Officials in the country say that the system will be used to fight crime.

These are applications that Proxim already addresses in the U.S., where it serves enterprise customers, and municipal, state and federal governments.

“Proxim’s decade-long focus on software development has created a noticeable differentiator between us and other 802.11n Wi-Fi equipment providers,” says Gopadze. “This cross layer resource allocation software is called WORP. That acronym stands for Wireless Outdoor Router Protocol.

“We develop Proxim wireless network infrastructure products (base station radios and customer premises equipment) by using a COTS-standard 802.11n chipset, then adding our own software into the package,” he adds. “This results in products that perform to a significantly higher standard for data transmission speeds, and quality and class of service characteristics than ordinary 802.11n equipment.”

Of course, 802.11n is one of the latest versions of the Wi-Fi standard, and WORP’s ability to drive MAC and applications layer performance coupled with MIMO antennas and OFDM enables performance benefits.

“We don’t focus on typical cellular or mobile data network infrastructure equipment, which use well known standards such as LTE or WiMAX (News - Alert),” continues Gopadze. “We sell into key high performance enterprise and service provider market segments [that] require 3G/4G performance. For example, WORP provides up to 270mbps of throughput from a 300mbps 802.11n base station radio or about 90 percent efficiency.” 

Proxim brings its products to market primarily via indirect channels. Its partners on this front include Connectronics, Westcon, Winncom Technologies and about 1,000 value-added resellers. Proxim also sells directly into carriers, including Tata, Telmex (News - Alert) and others.

Gopadze says Proxim sees the international market as being strong, and the U.S. market is picking up for the company, which reported revenue of about $30 million in 2010.

The 10-year-old company is the result of the combination of a handful of organizations, including Metricom/Ricochet, ORiNOCO, Proxim, Terabeam (News - Alert) and Western Multiplex.