News | February 23, 2001

Lat-Lon taps Aeris.net's microburst network for seamless, low-cost gps telemetry services

Source: Aeris SA
Aeris SAJOSE, Calif., January 2, 2001 - —<%=company%>, the leading provider of web-to-wireless machine-to-machine communications services, and Lat-Lon, a provider of GPS tracking and event monitoring telemetry units, announced an agreement to service the railroad, trucking and heavy machinery industries. Under the agreement, Aeris will provide Lat-Lon customers with a complete wireless data communications service via its MicroBurst network, which spans North America. Lat-Lon's GPS telemetry unit is fully certified and available today for fleet deployment.
Lat-Lon telemetry units gather positioning and report data for a variety of railway and trucking applications, including hoppers, coil covers, boxcars, auto rack cars and trailer tracking. Aeris.net's patented MicroBurst technology, which is embedded in Lat-Lon telemetry units, transmits the data over the unused channels of existing cellular networks to Lat-Lon's Web server. Recorded data can be automatically sent to a customer's fleet management software or stored on-line at www.lat-lon.com where they can access location histories, current fleet reports, and an interactive map with color-coded rail lines, towns and other features. Within a matter of seconds, MicroBurst technology can provide Lat-Lon customers with alerts indicating overspeed impact, an open door or dropping fluid levels.

"The most important issues for our customers are system reliability, coverage and price," said Dave Baker, president of Lat-Lon Inc. "Our telemetry units provide a durable monitoring and broadcast platform design to withstand the harsh railcar and trucking environment, and Aeris.net's MicroBurst network gives us the coverage we need with a market-beating price structure. Through our association with Aeris, our customers enjoy savings of better than 70 percent over other available communication technologies."

"We've designed our MicroBurst network to be developer-friendly," said Wade Vesey, vice president of marketing at Aeris.net. "Our technology not only offers developers the most extensive cellular coverage available now, but it also embraces future technologies so developers like Lat-Lon can make a seamless transition as the path for telemetry applications evolves."

How MicroBurst Works
MicroBurst™ technology is a patented utility that enables short data packets to be transmitted over control channels in cellular networks using standard IS-41C signaling mechanisms. These short data packets are transmitted by cellular devices and routed to the Aeris central hub facility over existing SS7 (Signaling System 7) networks. The Aeris hub identifies the service provider and routes the data for delivery via a back-end link, which includes Internet, dial-up and dedicated connectivity. The end-user is notified of activity via cell phone, pager, Web page or e-mail.

About Lat-Lon
Lat-Lon provides low cost, remote fleet tracking and event monitoring systems to the rail, road freight, and heavy equipment industries. Lat-Lon's compact telemetry units are self powered and can be installed in a few minutes. GPS tracking information and monitoring status is transmitted via the existing cellular network to Lat-Lon's database and is accessible by any Internet enabled PC.

About Aeris.net
Aeris.net, headquartered in San Jose, Calif., provides web-to-wireless connectivity and control for a broad array of short-packet signaling and messaging services using its proprietary MicroBurst utility. MicroBurst technology employs the control channel infrastructure of the cellular network as a transmission medium to achieve low cost of service and ubiquitous coverage. Aeris.net currently has contracts deploying MicroBurst technology in cellular service areas in the United States, Mexico and Canada. Initial applications include vehicle position and condition reporting, security and equipment monitoring and utility meter reading

MicroBurst™ is a trademark of Aeris.net, Inc. Aeris is a registered trademark of Aeris.net. All other company or product names are trademarks of their respective holders.