Internet provider North Rock Communications yesterday unveiled the weapons Bermuda could use to win the battle for the offshore e-commerce market.

The company plans to give businesses and homes ultra high-speed Internet access via wireless links which do not need any telephone line, or dial up facilities since they work by radio waves.

North Rock has signed an exclusive agreement with a listed Canadian company, WaveRider Communications Inc., which will supply them with the new wireless communications products and services in Bermuda.

The ambitious plans -- which would make Bermuda one of the first countries in the world to have wireless Internet access -- depend on the success of North Rock's application to the Telecommunications Commission to amend its licence.

The company, which has provided Internet access to businesses and homes here since 1997, wants to change its licence to allow it to provide services directly rather than having to depend on carriers like BTC or Quantum.

Personal and business users in Bermuda will win from Internet speed up to 100 times faster than current dial-up access with no involvement of telephone companies in delivering them.

E-commerce Minister Renee Webb was on hand yesterday to see another vital piece of the jigsaw slip into place to allow Bermuda to catch the lucrative offshore e-commerce wave.

The original enthusiasm to build e-commerce into a "third pillar'' of Bermuda's economy dates back to the previous Government's push led by now-Opposition Leader Pamela Gordon and Shadow Finance Minister Grant Gibbons.

But Ms Webb has vowed the new Government is fully committed to the project and has this week been looking at the second draft of the Electronic Transactions Bill which is due to be tabled in the House of Assembly in July.

Yesterday Ms Webb said the partnership between North Rock and WaveRider was a perfect fit with Bermuda's effort to "gear up to be a premier offshore jurisdiction with respect to e-commerce''.

"And of course Internet access and speed is very much a part of the infrastructure that will be needed to ensure that the development of the whole e-commerce industry in Bermuda as an offshore centre takes place,'' she said.

"So we have to ensure that our infrastructure is solid and this type of strategic partnership that has been developed is the type of partnership that we in Bermuda look kindly upon.

"It ties into what we would like to achieve as a Government and also as a country.'' WaveRider marketing vice president Charles Brown said Bermuda would be one of the first countries with wireless Internet access.

"Given the sophistication of Bermuda's business and residential population we anticipate a large demand for this new high speed access,'' he said.

And his company -- which raised $15 million with help from Prudential Securities last year -- specialised in developing, manufacturing and marketing easy-to-manage products which people could install themselves.

"Our roots are in the Internet. We are not a voice company trying to develop or take old products and turn them into Internet products. We actually own an Internet service provider.

"We understand the industry. We develop the industry and develop products to support it. That's our advantage.'' North Rock intends to offer businesses the ultra high-speed, wireless connection later this year and homes by the first quarter of next year.

Sales and marketing manager Vicki Coelho said the pricing of the new equipment would be modelled on what customers wanted, and customer service would also be more efficient than what telephone customers were used to.

"It's going to be very competitively priced as an alternative. Right now Internet access costs are based on a monthly fee and also the hours spent connected.

"But customers also pay access charges to have a separate phone line for their PC and each time they dial up that's another 20 cents which adds up pretty quickly.

"For this system they won't have those extra charges, and on top of that everything will work much more quickly and it's not all tied up with the phone lines which can cause problems -- as any Internet user knows.'' She said customers would get far higher bandwidth which could increase productivity since graphics and other often cumbersome files were sent and received so rapidly with the new system.

Anticipating large demand: Charles Brown