Edinburgh-based Wolfson Microelectronics is sampling its first active noise cancellation chip for mobiles.
"Until now handset manufacturers have been able to reduce noise in the transmit path only, so that background noise is not transmitted to the other party in the call," said Wolfson. "However they have been unable to do anything about the ambient noise levels near the listener’s ear."
The firms solution is to add active anti-noise to cancel background sound at the handset speaker.
"Active noise cancellation is a powerful tool for improving the user experience in mobile phones and also improving the economics and user satisfaction of mobile phone networks," said Wolfson’s v-p business development David Monteith. "We are working with a number of manufacturers now and believe handsets containing this technology will be on sale internationally during 2009."
This noise cancellation intellectual property came from UK firm Sonaptic which Wolfson bought less than a year ago.
"As a result of the acquisition we diversified our technology portfolio, expanded our total addressable market and are now enabling more enhanced user experiences," said CEO Dave Shrigley. "I am thoroughly delighted with the performance of the team who have developed this technology on an aggressive timeline."