Signature Q4 2008

In Retrospect | Q4 ’08 Aside from the fact that Bluetooth technology is now part of our lives (from the headsets or hands-free kits in our cars to the transfer of ﬁles over a Bluetooth wireless connection between devices), consumers’ perceptions of the technology and its breakthroughs have also given a boost to the wider industry. Back in the Day Low Energy in Action In the early days, wireless was often viewed with scepticism, something that was difﬁcult to set up, used too much power and, put simply, was just not practical for everyday applications for anyone less than a holder of a physics Ph.D. The idea of streaming voice or audio was not an obvious wireless application before Bluetooth technology. The idea of an ad hoc, secure method of wirelessly transferring information was unimaginable 10 years ago, especially if you’d ever tried to set up a wireless network at home. All of us in the industry have proven these perceptions wrong, and consumer attitudes have improved, as shown by growing adoption rates. We are also continually working to make the technology even more consumer friendly, through features such as secure simple pairing. From a technological standpoint, Bluetooth technology has contributed greatly to the wireless industry. Aside from the support of voice and audio, the most obvious contribution is single-chip, low-cost, low-power radios built in complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology. CSR’s early claims in this area were shot down by many companies who said RF CMOS would never work. Today, most of those companies either don’t exist or have adopted the same technology for their own wireless silicon. Having already shipped more than 1 billion of our BlueCore chips, we can say that our claims have stood the test of time. Meeting the Challenges The Bluetooth SIG demonstrated a Bluetooth low energy prototype for the ﬁrst time publicly in July at Wireless Japan 2008 in Tokyo. The demo used sensors to communicate weight and temperature data wirelessly over a Bluetooth low energy link to a modiﬁed Nokia mobile phone. CSR’s BlueCore7 device, which incorporates the Bluetooth low energy prototype, was at both ends of the link. The Bluetooth low energy speciﬁcation, designed for small, button cell battery-powered devices, is expected to be adopted and ready for use by mid-2009. It will deliver battery life of up to a year and extend Bluetooth technology into new markets with sensors and devices such as watches, toys, sports gear and health care equipment, as well as gaming and remote control devices. The other challenge we were up against in the early days was cost – that is, the target of US$5 for the cost of adding a Bluetooth wireless radio into an end product. Of course, the huge volumes today mean that prices have long since plummeted far below this ﬁgure for the sort of ROM-based, Bluetooth wireless integrated circuits used in mobile phones or headsets. It’s incredible to think that headset designers can now pull together a complete Bluetooth enabled headset using BlueVox2 for a bill of materials totaling not much more than US$5. Things have come a long way, and this really opens up the market: Bluetooth enabled headsets become potential bundling options with mobile phones and are within the reach of consumers in developing countries, who may not have been able to afford the US$100-plus headsets of old. A Bright Future That’s not to say that getting things working well wasn’t a challenge. What we learned very early on was the importance of software as part of the wireless development process. No wireless technology that has gone before (or come along since) has had anything like the scope of applications that we see being enabled by Bluetooth technology: handsets and headsets, PCs, car radios, music players, TVs, computer peripherals – even medical, industrial and retail applications. We made Bluetooth technology work in these applications, and through the collaborative efforts of the Bluetooth SIG, we also ensured these devices had the ability to talk to a wide range of other products from other manufacturers. That was a revolutionary achievement of which we should all be proud. However, making that interoperability work was no small feat, and getting it to work in all manner of end-product designs was where software development came in. We very quickly realized that embedding wireless technologies into challenging environments, such as a mobile phone or inside a car, was going to take more than just a good quality Bluetooth wireless radio. I’d argue that the success of Bluetooth technology, and particularly the success we at CSR have enjoyed, relates to the focus on making a quality radio work as well in a design as it does in the lab. Other wireless technologies have not had the beneﬁt of this focused effort on interoperability, and the development of Bluetooth technology has taught us a lot. 14 | SIGnature | Bluetooth.org We at CSR see an important change happening. In addition to the expansion of what we understand by the term “Bluetooth” (with the inclusion of Bluetooth low energy and high speed radios), the attach rate among Bluetooth enabled mobile phones provides an opportunity to integrate additional value-added technologies. As seen in the latest iteration of BlueCore, the Bluetooth Core Speciﬁcation Version 2.1 + EDR is now just one of a list of features embedded into the singlechip design: The chip combines Bluetooth low energy technology, FM radios (both transmit and receive) and even enhanced GPS (eGPS™). Since Bluetooth technology is already being built into well over half of the mobile phones on the market today, handset makers are seeing the value in having additional technologies built into the same chip to save on space, cost and power. It also means device manufacturers can be happy that the radios play nicely with each other. CSR calls this “the wireless connectivity center.” Over the next decade, the types of technologies and level of integration will continue to grow. It has a huge potential, and this stage of the Bluetooth technology evolution has only just begun. Alan Woolhouse is vice president of marketing communications at CSR, the leading Bluetooth wireless chip manufacturer, with headquarters in Cambridge, U.K. Celebrate 10 years of Bluetooth technology by sharing your story about the development of wireless connectivity. E-mail us at signature@bluetooth.com.

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Signature Q4 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.