TI will utilize the company’s well-known and proven radio technology in the 2.4 GHz frequency band to meet ULP Bluetooth specifications and drive affordable wireless connectivity into the mass market. TI is already a leading provider of mobile connectivity solutions, such as Bluetooth and ZigBee/802.15.4, making the company well positioned to address the ULP Bluetooth market. TI will be one of the few companies to support this technology for both mobile handsets and portable, low-power
devices – providing seamless interoperability between devices.
TI fully supports the new ULP Bluetooth open technology and recognizes the need for a radio standard that will complement Bluetooth and ZigBee for short- to medium-range wireless connectivity, said Karl Helmer Torvmark, strategic marketing, low-power wireless group at TI. TI is committed to providing the market’s most competitive and comprehensive solutions for ULP Bluetooth, which will enable customers to deliver complete, low-cost, low-power systems with shorter time-to-market.
Leveraging expertise with low-power devices, including microcontrollers, and Bluetooth solutions, TI is developing solutions for both types of ULP Bluetooth 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 devices such as handsets.
ULP Bluetooth and ZigBee represent complementary technologies, as ZigBee is a low-power infrastructure-oriented mesh networking technology supporting thousands of nodes, while ULP Bluetooth is a low-power ad hoc networking technology that links a small number of nodes to devices such as computers and mobile phones.