Wi-Fi contract means big boost for PCC Network Solutions.

Beating out 14 competitors, Chatsworth-based systems integration firm PCC Network Solutions, has been approved to install a pilot outdoor wireless program for the City of West Hollywood. The deal comes on the heels of PCC's recent installation of a wireless network for the City of Lompoc. Though the current value of the West Hollywood deal is only worth approximately $50,000, it has the opportunity to be worth much more if the city decides to expand the wi-fi service beyond the pilot program.

Slated to go live this fall, the wireless project will be the second wireless program to be enacted by a municipality in Los Angeles County (Cerritos being the first). The system will consist of seven wireless access points mounted on street lights at the top of traffic signals, spread out across a one mile area stretching along Santa Monica Boulevard, from Fairfax Avenue to La Brea Avenue. Those equipped with wireless devices will be able to log on to the Internet without the use of phone lines or other traditional wires that tether most Internet use to the office or home.

Daniel Faurlin, PCC's vice president of marketing, stressed the importance of the deal to the company.

"It's certainly a high visibility deal and it's very important to us that our solutions work to the city's satisfaction right from the get go," Faurlin said. "One of the main things that helped us get the bid was that they were looking at integrators who had done this type of systems integration before, and we had recently done the Lompoc project."

Faurlin believes that in all likelihood, West Hollywood will expand the wireless systems to include the entire city.