SAN DIEGO and SHENZEN, CHINA - October 31, 2002 - LightPointe, an innovator, designer and manufacturer of carrier-class optical transmission equipment using Free-Space Optics (FSO) technology, today announced a distribution agreement with Century Man Communications Equipment Co., Ltd. of Shenzen, China.
Century Man is deploying LightPointe's FlightTM FSO equipment in tandem with the Cisco Catalyst 6500® Series and the Cisco ONS 15454 Multiservice Provisioning Platform to carriers and enterprises in China, including the cities of Shanghai, Shenzhen, Hong Kong, and Beijing. Founded in October 1998, Century Man has customers in more than 30 provinces and regions throughout China. The company also develops and manufactures optical fiber connectors and exports products to more than a dozen countries outside of China.
"China and the Asia-Pacific region are important in LightPointe's global strategy to serve markets where telecommunications growth is strongest," said Mr. Carl Bai, LightPointe's Director of Sales for the China Region. "We see Century Man as a key partner to address part of the Chinese market, where demand for cost-effective network infrastructure builds favors LightPointe and FSO."
Mr. Liu Zili, Chief Engineer of Century Man, said his company this year has seen healthy demand for telecommunication solutions such as LightPointe FSO equipment that provides ultra-high bandwidth connectivity through the air at a fraction of the cost of traditional trenched fiber-optic cable, or where spectrum for microwave radios is too expensive or no longer available. FSO is a line-of-sight connectivity with applications for wire line carriers, mobile wireless carriers and enterprises.
"According to the actual installations," said Mr. Davis Chow, Century Man's FSO Project Manager, "we are confident of providing FSO products for the market in China."
LightPointe offers the FSO industry's broadest equipment portfolio, with products providing bandwidth from 10 megabits to 2.5 gigabits for carrier and enterprise customers. LightPointe FSO products are protocol independent and seamlessly integrate into existing optical fiber and mobile wireless networks. LightPointe has deployed more than 1,400 FSO systems in more than 30 countries and counts among its customers the world's leading businesses, carriers and system integrators, including Qwest, Telkom SA and others.
LightPointe provided a live product demonstration; with Mr. Bai presenting the business case for FSO at the recent Cisco Networkers Beijing 2002, Oct. 17 to Oct. 19 at the China World Hotel. Among the other participating companies in the Beijing event were Microsoft (China) Co., Ltd., EMC², NCR, and Intel.
About LightPointe
Founded in 1998, LightPointe designs and manufactures carrier-class optical transmission equipment using Free-Space Optics (FSO) technology that delivers high-speed communications solutions to service providers and businesses faster and more cost-effectively than traditional fiber-optic cable. LightPointe is headquartered in San Diego, California, with facilities in Dresden, Germany, and an advanced research center in Louisville, Colorado.To learn more about LightPointe's flexible, fast free-space optical solutions, visit www.lightpointe.com or www.freespaceoptics.org.
About Century Man
Century Man Communications Equipment Co., Ltd. was founded in October 1998. The company, which is ISO 9002 certified, has 400 employees and is among the top five in China for its telecommunication industry sector.
