Wibree – Page 2 – Creative Connectivity

Bluetooth low energy – the Momentum Builds

It’s been a good week for Bluetooth low energy. At times it’s felt like a long, slow path since it was first announced as Wibree in October 2006, but that feeling is changing as the standard is coming to completion. This week saw the first Bluetooth low energy conference take place in Munich where chips vendors were showing off demos, whilst on the other side of the world, at the ARM Techcon in Santa Clara, there were more live demonstrations of the technology.

The mood of the industry has become increasingly upbeat. It was noticeable in Munich that a significant number of companies have moved from cautious interest to being serious about starting to deploy it. The questions that they are asking have changed to the practical ones of qualification and access to test equipment. That change in mood was reinforced by the Bluetooth SIG announcing that the specification is on course to be released this December.

The Bluetooth low energy standard can be confusing at first. Although it carries the name Bluetooth, it is a completely new radio with a completely new protocol stack on top of it. It has been designed from scratch to allow developers to add connectivity to products that only want to send small pieces of data on an irregular basis, but with such low power consumption that it can run on coin cells. The companies attending the Conference in Munich have understood that difference and are keen to exploit the new products and service models that Bluetooth low energy offers.

Continua Health Alliance takes the bigamous route – Bluetooth and ZigBee.

After months of debate, the Continua Health Alliance finally announced its choice of wireless technology for low power medical devices. Bluetooth low energy and ZigBee have been the key antagonists in this process and today Continua decided to make it a threesome and share its bed with both partners.

Both brides proudly announced the forthcoming nuptials, Bluetooth claiming that it had been chosen as the Health Device Standard, and ZigBee pronouncing that it has been selected for the next generation standard.

Whilst most people outside the specification groups will dismiss this as irrelevant, it does have some important implications, as it presents medical device manufacturers with a dilemma – which of these two wireless standards do they choose? We’re at a point in time where we’re about to witness a new phenomenon of internet connected, consumer medical devices, which will open up the possibility of a new era of personal healthcare. If manufacturers become confused about which of two incompatible standards to use, they’ll delay their products, with a resulting delay in availability and implementation. It’s important that doesn’t happen.

PROFIBUS choose Bluetooth for Wireless Automation Standard

PI (PROFIBUS & PROFINET International) – the group leading manufacturing automation connectivity standards, has announced that having completed an investigation of the different wireless options, they are moving forward with the Bluetooth standard for their radio technology.

The announcement is part of a growing chorus of acceptance for Bluetooth technology, as its maturity, robustness to interference and interoperability propels it into a diverse range of applications where reliability is critical.

Bluetooth low energy will save forgetful US business travellers $300 million per year

At the Bluetooth low energy preview day in Tokyo, a spokesman for Nokia reported an interesting statistic. Every year, 300,000 laptops are lost or left behind by passengers at U.S. airports. Apparently that’s greater than the number of mobile phones left at airports, suggesting that most travellers consider their phone to be more important than their laptop, but that’s another story. At first sight the figure seems staggering, but it’s only around one laptop per airport per day. What is staggering is the resulting cost of replacement, which equates to a third of a billion dollars every year.

The reason for raising this statistic is to point out one of the new applications which will be made possible by Bluetooth low energy. Bluetooth low energy (previously known as Wibree) is the new Bluetooth standard that is coming out this year and which enables devices to be produced which include a wireless link to transmit small amounts of data, and support a battery life that can extend into years. One of the first applications that will ship is access control or proximity detection. Which is why it can save the US economy $300,000,000 every year.

Four new Bluetooth low energy chips announced at Developer’s Preview

At a packed conference hall in Tokyo today, the Bluetooth SIG hosted the first public demonstrations of the new Bluetooth low energy standard to an audience of press and consumer electronics companies. This new standard will enable a wide range of connected devices to communicate with and through mobile phones. Four new chips were announced at the all-day event – a sure sign of gathering momentum.

The exciting aspect of Bluetooth low energy is its ability to enable low cost devices to be made that can send their data all of the way to the web. It’s based on over ten years of experience and promises to have the fastest growing ecosystem of any wireless standard. Today’s meeting sent a clear message to developers that they need to start designing now to be ready for the first generation of Bluetooth low energy handsets.

ZigBee and the evil radios

Ten years ago, Bluetooth, 802.11 and HomeRF were engaged in an acrimonious battle for supremacy over leadership as the short range radio standard. HomeRF died, and in the following years Bluetooth and 802.11 found their areas of application and now coexist together, to the extent of joining forces in the new Bluetooth 3.0 specification. Today a new and ferocious fight is taking place for the role of ultra low power radio champion. This time, there is likely to be just one winner.

In the two main corners of the ring are ZigBee PRO and Bluetooth low energy (previously known as Wibree). Alongside them, throwing lighter punches, are an array of lesser contenders, including Z-Wave, ANT, Wavenis, and Wireless M-Bus. What is at stake is the prize of becoming the standard for connecting low power consumer products to the next generation of mobile phones and enabling smart energy devices within the home.