Antenna Company Launches First Wi-Fi 6E MIMO System

Netherlands-based Antenna Company, which specializes in the design of high-performance embedded antennas, on Nov. 12 introduced a new Wi-Fi 6E MIMO antenna system designed to increase network capacity, extend range and reduce latency in enterprise and industrial IoT networks. 

The antenna system enables simultaneous operation in the 2.4, 5 and 6 GHz frequency bands, resulting in an additional 1.2 GHz of spectrum and greater than 2x increase in available channels. 

Optimized for direct integration into wireless access points, Antenna Company’s design supports a total of 15 antennas, including dedicated 4×4 5GHz + 4×4 6GHz + 4×4 2.4/5GHz Wi-Fi antennas. Cross-pair Wi-Fi antenna isolation of greater than 45 dB is achieved for concurrent operation in the 5GHz band.   

An additional 0.9/2.4GHz IoT antenna is included to enable IoT use cases, along with tri-band 2.4/5/6GHz antennas for radio spectrum management. The entire antenna system is mounted on a metal backplate to enable mechanical, thermal and RF integration with the access point, the company said.

The design also comes with an Ultra-Wide Band (UWB) option to enable Real-Time Location System (RTLS) services such as access control, indoor navigation, asset tracking and contact tracing. The UWB antennas support channels 5 and 9 for worldwide spectrum coverage. To avoid coupling and detuning between antennas, greater than 30 dB of isolation is achieved between the UWB and Wi-Fi antennas.

The new Wi-Fi 6E + UWB antenna system, according to the company, also features:

• compact design that enables size reduction of enterprise access-points by 20% or more, without sacrificing antenna system performance;
• low-input impedance essential to achieve peak data rates for 80/160 MHz channels; 
• uniform radio coverage to avoid nulls and blind spots.

“Wi-Fi 6E enables the capacity, speed and latency needed to support the shift in network usage for enterprise and Industrial IoT markets. The addition of UWB gives our customers a scalable platform to offer new RTLS services,” CEO David Favreau told eWEEK.  

“The adoption of high-performance WiFi 6E antenna systems is a key enabling technology to fully realize the benefits of the unlicensed spectrum between 5.925 and 7.125GHz,” said Mark Hung, VP Technology and Engineering at the Wi-Fi Alliance.  

For more information, email the company at information@antennacompany.com.