Trilliant buys broadband wireless for smart grid
by Martin LaMonica
GreenTech
May 28, 2009
Trilliant on Thursday said it has acquired SkyPilot Networks to bring broadband wireless
networking to utility smart-grid programs. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
The acquisition of SkyPilot Networks, which used to sell municipal Wi-Fi systems, will
allow Trilliant to offer utilities a way to build a private broadband network, according to
company executives.
So-called smart meters have a communications link back to utilities, which use that
information to getter understanding of changes in demand to run the transmission grid
more efficiently. Trilliant supplies radio communications cards that go into meters and
software for utilities to run these networks.
To carry information from people's home meters back to the utilities' data centers, the
route is combination of networks. Trilliant's gear can create a mesh network among
different homes where it can then be transferred to an aggregation point such as a
substation. Often, utilities rely on digital cellular networks for the "backhaul" network
back to their data centers, said Eric Miller, the senior vice president of marketing at
Trilliant.
With SkyPilot's base stations, utilities can do that backhaul network using relatively long-
range Wi-Fi, Miller said. With the signal range as much as 10 miles, Trilliant imagines
that SkyPilot's gear will be used to aggregate smart meter information in one city for
transmission back to utilities or to be used to reach rural places that don't have good
cellular service.
Another option for longer networking jumps is WiMax. General Electric, using Intel
chips, is testing a WiMax-based system with utility CenterPoint. Cisco, too, said it is
entering the smart grid area with a range of networking options.
Both WiMax and Wi-Fi offer faster bandwidth, which is important to communicate an
outage or for demand-response applications. In general, broadband connection are
important to realize the potential of the smart grid, letting utilities run many applications
on the communications infrastructure, said Jesse Berst, the founding editor of Smart Grid
News.
SkyPilots Wi-Fi mesh networking gear has the range of WiMax but is cheaper, said Brian
Jenkins, director of marketing for the company. "We take standard chips and make
system look like a WiMax in terms of range and capacity," he said.
The company will continue to serve its municipal Wi-Fi customers but shifted its focus to
utilities recently, Jenkins said.
Martin LaMonica is a senior writer for CNET's Green Tech blog. He started at CNET
News in 2002, covering IT and Web development. Before that, he was executive editor at
IT publication InfoWorld. E-mail Martin.