Aspiring for big savings in small packages: RadioFrame uses expertise from former McCaw execs to sell picocell base station equipment to carriers.(marketing of RadioFrame Networks)(McCaw Cellular Communications Inc.)(Company Profile)

Remember Project Angel? Back in the 1990s, it was such an "emerging technology" that even some of the engineers hired to work on the project didn't know what they were signing up for.

Sometimes things come full circle. Some of the leaders of AT&T Wireless Services' Project Angel--one of the most infamous wireless local loop systems--are together again. This time, it's with a venture-backed firm called RadioFrame Networks. Founded in 1999, it's backed by some of the biggest names in wireless: Craig McCaw, Steve Hooper, Nick Kauser, and its chairman is Rob Mechaley. In fact, five of the top seven senior executives are former McCaw Cellular Communications execs.

Based--where else?--in Bellevue, Wash., the company boasts a base station product lineup that includes solutions for backhaul, temporary events and in-building environments. RadioFrame has a handful of trials either under way or in the queue with European and North American operators, but its most lucrative deal to date is its multimillion-dollar contract with Nextel Communications.

Back in March, Nextel said it would expand its contract with RadioFrame to deploy its MC-Series base station solution. And RadioFrame managers say they're confident in theft multiyear deal despite Nextel's merger with Sprint, which was set in motion before RadioFrame even inked the contract with Nextel.

RadioFrame executives say one of their selling points is that the MC-Series uses a software-controlled technology platform and supports migration to any technology platform, be it 2.5G or 3G. According to RadioFrame's vice president of engineering, Greg Veintimilla, who worked on Project Angel in the 1990s, he and his colleagues learned first-hand what a huge deal it is for a carrier to make a major technology decision. Now at RadioFrame, the group is trying to make it easy on their carrier customers by providing solutions for any air interface--GSM, GPRS, EDGE, iDEN and Wi-Fi, with CDMA 2000 and UMTS solutions under development.

Founder Mechaley sees a never-ending series of technology upgrades in wireless. The idea is to apply somewhat of a Legos theory to wireless gear, where RadioFrame supports every iteration of next-gen systems. "I think we should always benefit from advances in technology as rapidly as we can" he says.

Hooper, a founder of Ignition Partners, one of the venture capital firms that invested in the company, calls RadioFrame's solution an "elegant" one for carriers. While it's not 100 percent software-defined radio (SDR)--and even SDR Forum members may differ on its exact meaning--SDR is part of RadioFrame's technology. About 80 percent of its business is software-driven, with just 20 percent on hardware, for which the company uses various North American contract manufacturers. RadioFrame says its picocell solutions not only cut down on expenses related to power supply, but also those related to HVAC requirements.

Phil Marshall, an analyst at the Yankee Group, says the in-building market, for one, is becoming more important as wireless service providers roll out advanced data services. "These guys have a compelling solution" he says of RadioFrame, adding it will be important to minimize integration requirements for service providers and keep their costs in check, both aspects that RadioFrame executives say they offer, although they declined to reveal specific pricing information.

How is the company selling its technology to carriers already spending heavily on network upgrades? RadioFrame CEO and President Jeff Brown says that at the end of the day, carriers are trying to solve a problem or go after new markets. With networks moving toward higher and higher data speeds and 3G types of solutions, network managers are in need of space-saving, future-proof and economical solutions, which is where RadioFrame comes in.

"A simple way to look at it is we really are an additional tool in the toolset of the guy who's managing the network," says Rick Applegate, RadioFrame's senior vice president of sales and marketing.

The McCaw team took a risk in the 1980s, stitched together a wireless network and made a windfall when they sold it to AT&T in 1994. With several of them together again, can they make a repeat performance, albeit at a different level?

Brown acknowledges that while RadioFrame works closely with carriers, it often goes through OEMs that carriers are familiar with when it comes to trials or deployments. It wouldn't be a stretch of the imagination to see one of those OEMs consider an acquisition of RadioFrame. But, Brown says, "None of us are in a rush to make it happen." Apparently, the gang is having too much fun on its own.

RELATED ARTICLE: Angel's wings clipped, but not grounded.

Today, one need not look far to see the offshoots of what was the former AT&T Wireless Service's proprietary Project Angel, which consisted of pizza-box sized dishes mounted on homes to deliver high-speed Internet and voice services using fixed wireless.

It was designed in part as an end-run around local phone services. And while AT&T laid it to rest in 2001, the core technology ended up in the hands of Netro Corporation and eventually SR Telecom in Canada when it acquired Netro.

"Project Angel was a great idea ... It was just 10 years ahead of its time," says Steve Hooper, a former AT&T Wireless CEO and longtime Craig McCaw colleague who now serves as founding partner of venture capital firm Ignition Partners.

Back in the 1990s, AT&T gathered talent from vendors around the country to make its vision of Project Angel a reality. Elliott Hoole, who was with Texas Instruments before joining AT&T Wireless, was a member of the team that won patent honors in 1999 for their development of the core airlink technology in the Project Angel system.

Now vice president of technology development at RadioFrame Networks, he recalls how engineers didn't know exactly what they were getting into at the start of the super-stealth project to develop a wireless local loop system, which ended up as an early version of OFDM-based systems that would later pop up in everything from 802.11g to 4G. "You just had to take a leap of faith and join the team," Hoole says.