Case Study: IEC (Illinois Electric Cooperative) achieves a cost-effective high-capacity broadband upgrade and revenue growth with Proxim Wireless

Proxim Provides Broadband Services for Illinois Electric Cooperative

IEC (Illinois Electric Cooperative), a public utility serving about 2,300 square miles, needed to upgrade its in-house fixed wireless internet service to meet growing bandwidth expectations and get more capacity at the same base station/CPE price point. To achieve that, IEC engaged Wireless Data Systems to evaluate vendors and selected Proxim Wireless, using Proxim’s Tsunami® point-to-multipoint and backhaul radios, ORiNOCO® access points, and the PV A (ProximVision Advanced) cloud-based carrier management/WLAN controller.

Wireless Data Systems deployed Proxim Wireless gear across a 10-county area—about 50 Tsunami® QB-8000/QB-10100 backhaul radios, roughly 50 Tsunami® base stations and over 1,000 CPE units (about 1,200 radios total), plus ORiNOCO® APs—managed with PV A. The Proxim Wireless solution delivered higher throughput and better noise mitigation while reusing existing tower real estate, enabling IEC to cost-effectively expand service, increase revenue and profits, and drive strong customer demand to upgrade additional towers.

IEC (Illinois Electric Cooperative)

Sean Middleton

Manager of Engineering