Ether2

Our mission is to close the digital divide, connecting 4 billion people without regular access to basic information.  In fact, on June 5, 2011 the United Nations declared Internet access a human right.  So what should we do, send UN telecom peace keeping forces?

Intel research points to a future world that will be possible once we can achieve Intel’s description of “ensemble computing”.  We call it cloud on steroids, because cloud today truly exists only in the data center.  However, ensemble computing is like extending the cloud architecture all the way to the edge of the network.  So imagine a DDOS attack that can’t be mounted because of load balancing at the edge and nodes collaborating to defend the enterprise network. 

Cooperative peering, packet forwarding and a world of multi-connectedness where your device transmits over the least cost route will finally be possible. 

Ether2 is partnered with Illinois Institute (IIT, Chicago) and Universidad Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC/CTTC, Barcelona); both are equity stakeholders in the company.  The development community called EcoNode (Ether2 Community Network Operators & Developers) will be comprised of engineers and it will also serve as an independent governing body among community members.

Because we are partnered within academia and outside engineers who embody the body and spirit of the EcoNode development community, we have listed the extended team.  The four Ether2 principals are at the bottom.

• Prof. Pai Chou and Ph.D. students, UC, Irvine
• J.P. Norair, Chief Systems Architect, Dash7 Alliance
• Hans Bristell, Multicast Entertainment TV
• Jack Van der Star, WaveTeq
• Paul Sand, Salare Security
• Dr. Amy Vanderbilt, DARPA XProgram Systems
• Roger Thorpe and the Advanced Architectures team
• Drs. L. Alonzo & J. Alonso-Zárate and Ph.D. students, UPC/CTTC Barcelona
• Gary Bahadur, KRAA Security…Ether2 seed investor and President
• Dr. Graham Campbell, Inventor, 20 year Prof. IIT, Ether2 Co-Founder
• David Dietrich, MBA, Chief Systems Architect, Ports of LA & Long Beach, Ether2 Co-Founder & CEO
• Jonathan Gael, Chief Evangelist, Ether2 Co-Founder

Ether2 will be the Dolby of data networks.  We will charge device OEMs a fraction of a point for edge and end-user devices that use our IP.  Chip developers and network OEMs will have a free license.  EcoNode is the Ether2 Community Network Operators & Developers. 

While the big picture is to take data networks from adolescense to maturity in terms of features that are just not possible today, we also envision consumers having the choice to fire the carriers and cable MSOs.  The low hanging fruit, however, is mobile backhaul and we would approach it as a platform play.  Specifically, green field network applications such as scalable mesh networks in WiFi and 4G, the Internet of Things and TV White Space.

We have a better solution than 40 years of data network development can ever achieve.  No other company is attempting to solve this fundamental flaw that inhibits broadcast from IP networks.  Further, there is no other technology that combines the best features of circuit and packet switching.  Ether2 offers the deterministic qualities of circuit-switched networks with the economics of packet-switched shared networks. 

Further, because we can run anything 802.x.x on top of our near-perfect MAC, we can keep adding users to the network without incurring overhead...just like a TV or radio station broadcasting broadband connectivity; and because we are independent of the physical medium, we can be wired or wireless.

Our family of protocols was originally designed for cable TV with set top boxes, so the network is controlled entirely from the edge resulting in the elimination of middle switching and routing hardware in the access networks. 

We've also built security into the architecture because it shouldn't be the burden of the end-user.