Northrop Grumman, DARPA Set New Standard for Wireless Transmission Speed

From Northrop Grumman:

REDONDO BEACH, Calif. – Aug. 22, 2018 – Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) have set a new standard for wireless transmission by operating a data link at 100 gigabits per second (Gbps) over a distance of 20 kilometers in a city environment.

The two-way data link, which featured active pointing and tracking, was demonstrated Jan. 19, 2018 in Los Angeles.

The blazing data rate is fast enough to download a 50 Gigabyte blue ray video in four seconds. The demonstration marked the successful completion of Northrop Grumman’s Phase 2 contract for DARPA’s 100 Gbps (100G) RF Backbone program.

The 100G system is capable of rate adaptation on a frame by frame basis from 9 Gbps to 102 Gbps to maximize data rate throughout dynamic channel variations. Extensive link characterization demonstrated short-term error-free performance from 9 to 91 Gbps, and a maximum data rate of 102 Gbps with 1 erroneous bit received per ten thousand bits transmitted.