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cMesh-networking radio for mission-critical applications

1st September 2017
Lanna Deamer
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The company that enables off-grid, long range mobile communications on regular smartphones regardless of cell service, WiFi, satellites, or base stations, goTenna is exhibiting its third product, the goTenna Pro at DSEI as the company prepares for imminent shipping to end-customers in Q4 2017.

The goTenna Pro is a professional-grade, mesh-networking tactical radio, that comes in a candy-bar form factor and at a price-point most comparable to the cost of a single replacement battery for legacy systems.

The goTenna Pro is designed for use by mission-critical users and has already been adopted widely across the global Special Operations Forces (SOF) community. The device works in conjunction with the simple goTenna Pro smartphone app - or with any variety of apps built atop goTenna Pro’s open software development kit (such as the Android Tactical Assault Kit [ATAK]) - to allow users to send and receive critical situational awareness data over many miles and across various terrain, without any kind of centralised infrastructure.

Before the goTenna Pro, this kind of high performance mesh-capable radio system would cost tens of thousands of dollars per unit and be extremely bulky - representing an insurmountable barrier to acquisition for almost all except the most well-funded military operators. With goTenna Pro, however, this paradigm has fundamentally shifted, and for the first time, the most powerful type of off-grid tactical communications can be had for only $499 per unit.

Simply put, the goTenna Pro is fourty times less expensive, twelve times smaller, ten times lighter, and thirty times more energy efficient than any other comparable mesh networking tactical radio system. Plus, with its intuitive smartphone integration, operationalisation is immediate - no special training is required, as it works just like any other messaging and mapping app on your smartphone.

Some of the key enhancements in goTenna Pro relative to the company’s existing consumer product line are:

  • Professional grade, high performance mesh networking
  • Upgraded 5W variable output power
  • Software-defined tunable VHF/UHF radio (142-175 and 445-480MHz)
  • Greatly upgraded radio sensitivity (-124dBm)
  • SMA antenna connector for easy operation with any legacy antennas
  • Military grade ruggedisation (MILSPEC and IP68)
  • Intrinsic safety for explosive environments
  • Upgraded battery life exceeding 60 hours per charge
  • Complementary enterprise fleet management portal
  • Continues to be the only mesh networking tactical radio without ITAR or other export restrictions.

By providing a reliable mode of long range multi-hop communication that operates independent of top-down infrastructure at an affordable cost and user-friendly form factor, the goTenna Pro is accessible to everyone from non-profit relief workers to local fire and police, through to both SOF and conventional defense personnel. goTenna Pro not only brings new users to the table who were previously shut out from high quality mesh-capable communications in the past, but it also makes entirely new kinds of communications architectures possible for the first time.

New possible network architectures include deploying to the field with multiple Pro units on each user so as to bread-crumb devices in challenging or obstructed environments to ensure reliable communications no matter what - all practically possible thanks to the low cost and SWaP of the device. Teams can also interconnect goTenna Pro with traditional networking systems like WiFi, LTE, or satellite to push the tactical edge of the network out further than before, through a flexible and long range hub-and-spoke network architecture.

“goTenna Pro will improve the line of communication between teams and institutions that require resilient, scalable communications in incredibly demanding, mission-critical situations,” said Jorge Perdomo, goTenna’s Co-founder and VP of Product. “The ease-of-use and affordability of Pro brings the power of off-grid mesh-networking to anyone from non-profit humanitarian workers to the most well-funded defense and enterprise organisations, helping them perform their important jobs day-to-day and during emergencies.”

At launch, goTenna Pro will be available for purchase directly from goTenna.com as well as via authorised distribution partners. In conjunction with the launch of goTenna Pro, goTenna will also offer a cloud-based fleet management portal and the goTenna Professional Deployment Kit. The goTenna Professional Management Portal is a full-featured web portal for the provisioning, management, and maintenance of enterprise teams’ goTenna Pro devices, and is included with the purchase of any Pro device for free, with the option to upgrade to certain paid SaaS features. The goTenna Professional Deployment Kit enables operators to maintain as well as efficiently deploy up to 30 goTenna Pro units and their partner apps in any situation without any need for network connectivity anywhere in the world.

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