Wi-LAN'S W-OFDM Products Shipping to Eleven Countries On Four Continents; BWS 3000 Series in Commercial Deployment.

Business Editors & Technology Writers

CALGARY, Canada--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 7, 2002

Wi-LAN Inc. (TSE:WIN), a global innovator of high-speed wireless data/Internet communications, announced today that its market-leading BWS 3000 Series products, based on its patented W-OFDM (Wide-band Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) technology, have been sold in China and ten other countries including Canada. For service providers offering broadband wireless access, the BWS 3000 Series offers superior multipath robustness, improved non-line of sight (NLOS) performance and high spectral efficiency, which translates into more customers per cell-site, maximum usage of valuable licensed spectrum, higher effective data transmission rates and a range of up to 20 kilometres.

"We have sold over $1 million of the BWS 3000 Series since we began shipping in late October 2001, and we have firm purchase orders for an additional $1 million," said Dr. Sayed-Amr El-Hamamsy, Chief Operating Officer, Wi-LAN Inc. "Wi-LAN's BWS 3000 Series products have created a lot of excitement in the broadband wireless market. They have the capacity and capability to meet the high-speed data requirements of service providers in the most demanding non-line-of-sight geographies and very high density urban settings."

Operating at an unprecedented throughput of up to 192 megabits per second per six-sector cell, Wi-LAN's BWS 3000 Series includes access points and customer premises equipment, and can be used in broadband access applications alone or in combination with wired alternatives. Using a cellular network design, Wi-LAN's solution can easily serve a growing customer base. Network cells can be expanded quickly and cost effectively. By starting small and expanding, network operators experience early profits.

"We now have several months of experience in rolling out the Wi-LAN BWS products and we are seeing unprecedented capabilities," says Niklas Lindhe, Business Development - New Markets of Tele2 AB. "The BWS 3000 is now in commercial operation and has proved its promise of increased capacity. The OFDM technology solves many of the practical problems associated with near line of sight installations, making the system very robust and significantly outperforming the DS-CDMA and FH-CDMA (TDMA)-based wireless systems in our operations."

The current hardware is capable of supporting several generations of enhancement to the system software. Features such as quality of service, voice-over-IP, video services, and differentiated customer access are being made available, as the market requires, via over-the-air software upgrades. Also, current products will have a migration path to future products based on the emerging IEEE 802.16a (North America) and ETSI BRAN HyperMAN (European and international) standards, so there is no need for service providers to wait for these standards to be finalized before rolling out their broadband wireless networks.

"We are very excited about our deployment of Wi-LAN's BWS 3000 series in China," said Lok Chow, President of Wi-Comm Communications Co. Ltd., a Chinese joint venture company, 20% owned by Wi-LAN and based in Beijing, China. "Wi-LAN's BWS 3000 series enables Wi-Comm to offer service providers the best price-to-performance wireless access solutions. We have committed to the purchase of over $9 million (US$5.9 million) of the BWS 3000 Series in 2002, and we are ahead of schedule and hope to maintain this momentum."

The BWS 3000 Series, which includes the previously announced BWS 3500, is offered in 3.5 MHz, 7 MHz and 14 MHz channel widths, in various frequencies covering the worldwide 3.x GHz licensed spectrum (3.0 GHz to 4.01 GHz). The series meets the needs of service providers who have obtained spectrum licenses from government licensing bodies in more than 40 countries worldwide.

The BWS 2000 Series, including the 2.4 GHz license-exempt frequency band and the 2.5 GHz North American licensed frequency band, and the BWS 5000 Series, including the 5.8 GHz license-exempt frequency band, are in advanced stages of development and Wi-LAN intends to commercialize these products as the market matures.

Wi-LAN's AWE product line, based on Direct Sequence Spread

Spectrum (DSSS) and Wi-LAN's patented Multi-Code DSSS (MC-DSSS) technology, currently serves the needs of customers deploying broadband wireless systems in the license-exempt 2.4 GHz and 5.8 GHz frequency bands with throughput of up to 72 megabits per second per six-sector cell.

The W-OFDM Advantage

W-OFDM is a variation of OFDM that further improves its characteristics. The signal reception is corrected for distortions, allowing greater transmission speeds, and the signal is processed to maximize the range and multipath resistance. W-OFDM allows lower-power, multipoint radio frequency (RF) networks to be implemented, minimizing interference with adjacent networks.

W-OFDM effectively permits several independent channels to operate within the same frequency band, allowing multipoint networks and point-to-point backbone systems to be overlaid on one another. Less disruption of adjacent users and insensitivity to external noise means that high-speed multipoint data networks can be simply and rapidly deployed. These systems are tolerant of changes in the RF environment, limiting maintenance requirements, and the systems can be easily and economically expanded to meet the service provider's growing business.

About Wi-LAN Inc.

Wi-LAN is a global innovator in the field of high-speed wireless data communications, specializing in high-speed Internet access, LAN/WAN extension and broadband wireless access. Wi-LAN is the Chair Company of the OFDM Forum (www.ofdm-forum.com). Wi-LAN believes its W-OFDM patent is necessary for the implementation of devices using the IEEE 802.11a, IEEE 802.11g or ETSI BRAN HiperLAN/2 standards. Wi-LAN's products have been sold in more than 50 countries on six continents. Wi-LAN's common shares trade on The Toronto Stock Exchange under the symbol "WIN." Detailed information on Wi-LAN can be found at www.wi-lan.com.