Groningen, Netherlands has hired Unwired Holding CV to deploy and manage a citywide wireless broadband network. The city center expects to be unwired by October 2009, with the entire city completed by 2010.

After a successful pilot, the Wireless Groningen project enters the next phase.Unwired Holding CV is the company that is going to roll out and deploy the city wide wireless network in Groningen. In October, the network will be ready for use. In the beginning of 2011, the entire city, including Hoogkerk will have a wireless network.

City wide

Wireless Groningen is in several respects a special project. Special because it is one of the first city wide wireless WIFI networks in the world, special because it is not a collection of hot spots but a city wide WiFi network, particularly in scale, because there are no networks of such size and finally by the particular model of cooperation from which Wireless Groningen has evolved. The Wireless Groningen Foundation was established by the University of Groningen, Groningen municipality and the Hanze University. These three parties have in advance guaranteed to make use of the services of Unwired
Holding CV.

Because Wireless Groningen encompasses the whole city the range of applications is huge. Think about location based access to information, access to educational networks and tourist information for visitors to the city. In addition, the wireless network will be a testbed for new applications such as
collecting sensor information and location based applications and remote management.

The Akkoord of Groningen and Wireless Groningen

The Akkoord of Groningen is a collaboration between the municipality of Groningen, Hanze University Groningen, University of Groningen and University Medical Center Groningen. By acting as equal partners to attract and invest in innovation and knowledge, the city wants to grow to a hub of knowledge. A city with a strong knowledge, innovation and entrepreneurial climate. In this Akkoord context the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen suggested in 2005 the idea of a city wide wireless network. Now there are four parties, the University of Groningen, the municipality of Groningen, Hanze
University and the Noorderpoort College that will be the first users of the city wide network.