14 DAY TRIAL // Texas Instruments announced its intentions of developing products and solutions for Ultra Low Power (ULP) Bluetooth wireless technology, formerly known as Wibree. ULP Bluetooth technology, created as a result of the recent merger between the Wibree Forum and the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) is the first open technology that extends wireless connectivity between mobile devices or PCs and small, battery-operated devices such as watches, wireless keyboards, toys and sports sensors.
Texas Instruments will use its radio technology in the 2.4 GHz frequency band to meet ULP Bluetooth wireless technology specifications and drive affordable wireless connectivity into the mass market. The company is already providing mobile connectivity solutions, such as Bluetooth and ZigBee/802.15.4 technology, making the company well positioned to address the ULP Bluetooth wireless technology market. Texas Instruments will be one of the few companies to support this technology for both mobile handsets and portable, low-power devices.
"Texas Instruments fully supports the new ULP Bluetooth open technology and recognizes the need for a radio standard that will complement Bluetooth and ZigBee wireless technology for short- to medium-range wireless connectivity," said Karl Helmer Torvmark, strategic marketing, low-power wireless group at Texas Instruments. "Texas Instruments is committed to providing the market's most competitive and comprehensive solutions for ULP Bluetooth wireless technology, which will enable customers to deliver complete, low-cost, low-power systems with shorter time-to-market."
ULP Bluetooth and ZigBee are complementary wireless technologies, with ZigBee being a low-power infrastructure-oriented mesh networking technology supporting thousands of nodes, while ULP Bluetooth is a low-power networking technology that links a small number of nodes to devices such as computers and mobile phones.
Texas Instruments is developing solutions for both types of ULP Bluetooth wireless technology implementations: a single-mode implementation for watches,sensors and other tiny devices; and a dual-mode implementation for communication with both single-mode and traditional Bluetooth-enabled devices, such as handsets.