Forget WiFi. That’s the opinion of the former top engineer for the Federal Communications Commission, who said that WiFi has reached maturity and that the next phase of home or office networks will be dominated by WiMedia.

Edmond Thomas said at a press conference at the Consumer Electronics Show that ultra-wideband technology ultimately will reach more than a gigabit per second, providing both increased bandwidth of up to 1 GHz/second and low power consumption in a limited space.

Ultra-wideband was approved by the FCC in 2002 for three specific markets, imaging at less than 960MHz or between 3.1GHz and 10.6GHz; vehicular radar systems, between 22GHz and 29GHz; and communications systems in the upper range of the imaging market. He said the bandwidth was developed to avoid interference with global positioning and radar applications.

“By the end of this year, it will be authorised in Europe, Korea and Japan,” Thomas said, noting that he believes the IEEE 802.15.3 standard will be phased out next year. “Within the next five to seven years, ultra-wideband will be universally accepted. It will be the same as WiFi, if not better.

He noted that the ideal distance for WiMedia will be 50 metres, with chip costs of less than $5 and probably closer to $2.

Thomas is not alone in his prediction about the growth of ultra-wideband. In-Stat predicts that between 2006 and 2009, shipments of ultra-wideband-enabled products will increase 144 per cent.

A number of major players and some newcomers already are lining up to tap into that growth. On one side, major players such as Texas Instruments, Philips, STMicro, Intel, Nokia and Hewlett-Packard are looking at the WiMedia Alliance’s approach to ultra-wideband as an extension of universal serial bus (USB) technology.

Yoram Solomon, director of strategic marketing and industry relations for Texas Instruments’ Mobile Connectivity Solutions, said ultra wideband will be a well-known successor to USB. “To the consumer, it’s the same USB but wireless. WiFi was adopted quickly because it was wireless Ethernet.”

That’s not the only approach under development for ultra-wideband, however. Barry Hoberman, president and CEO of tZero, said that using USB limits the speed and quality of the wireless connection. “The key parameter for us is 20 metres at 110 megabits per second and extremely high reliability. Our first application is for radio. Using our solution, a radio will operate without line of sight and through walls.”

Hoberman said that the industry standard is only for line-of-sight communication. He said that using a non-USB approach, consumers can get streaming video for up to three channels, defect-free.

Rajeev Krishnamoorthy, tZero’s CTO, said there currently are six different models for communication through walls, ranging from sheet rock to concrete. He said the goal is to provide a communications infrastructure that works across all of them, something not possible with a line-of-sight approach available with USB.

www.tzti.com

See also: Electronics Weekly's roundup of content related to WiFi