Norwood Systems, developer of office networks for the wireless generation, announces that EnterpriseMobility is now able to interoperate with PC cards from leading PC communications card manufacturer, Brainboxes.

This is a breakthrough for businesses creating a wireless environment as it allows people to use their laptops as base stations, lowering the overall cost of deploying Bluetooth wireless voice and data networks. The Brainboxes Bluetooth PC card enables voice connectivity to cordless headsets and mobile phones as well as data connectivity to PDAs.

Jean-Paul Deschamps, co-founder, COO and VP of marketing for Norwood Systems, believes this to be a very important step in Bluetooth enabling the wireless office environment. “Brainboxes is one of the first PC card manufacturers supporting voice and we are delighted that its cards are now interoperating with EnterpriseMobility. This agreement with Brain Boxes is one of many such relationships that will free people from their desktops and allow them to place or receive calls, access emails or intranets and synchronise their calendar wherever they are in the office.”

Stephen Evans, Marketing Manager at Brainboxes, is delighted with this advance. “We have been able to produce what is in effect an incredibly low cost base station. Laptop and PDA use is increasing exponentially and fewer people are relying on the traditional office infrastructure, such as PCs and fixed-line telephones. Working with the team at Norwood Systems and configuring our PCMCIA card for EnterpriseMobility, we have been able to enhance communication dramatically, for today’s busy workforce.”

The Bluetooth SIG has recently certified Brainboxes’ PCMCIA Card as being compliant with the Bluetooth 1.1 standard. It has the capability of working with any handheld PC or PDA and operates with every major operating system, including Windows 2000, 98, 95 and CE. The card is a Bluetooth ‘Class 1 device’ and in tests, Brainboxes has achieved a range of 40 metres for communications from the Bluetooth-enabled laptop.

Norwood Systems is trialing the PC card with several medium and large companies and it will become commercially available in Q4 2001.