SmartSynch will provide public wireless communications technology for OpenWay, Itron's new advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) platform that is currently under development.

SmartSynch's development efforts will enable wide-area network (WAN) connectivity to OpenWay CENTRON residential meters by providing an integrated, under-the-cover public wireless communications module for those utilities that intend to leverage networks like GPRS or Wi-Fi for transmission of all critical metering and event data from their meters . Like all other OpenWay network components, SmartSynch's public wireless communications module for the meter will support the ANSI C12.22 standard for communication of metering-based data over a network.

Because Itron's OpenWay system architecture is based on open standards, utilities have flexibility selecting communications technology appropriate for their needs. For utilities that choose to communicate with their meters via public wireless communication networks, Itron's OpenWay metering devices will be embedded with SmartSynch's wireless technology to facilitate two-way communications, interval and on-demand reads, outage notification, tamper and theft detection, remote firmware upgrades, and a host of additional advanced metering capabilities. The SmartSynch component supports data communications on multiple public wireless networks, including GSM/GPRS, CDMA/1xRTT and Wi-Fi.