Bluetooth Chip Hits the Magic $5 Price Point
03:04 AM GMT on Oct 16, 2000
[CMP Media Inc]
Since its inception in 1998, Bluetooth technology has held out the promise of wireless 2.45-GHz connectivity for the handheld-appliance market. But Bluetooth has yet to fulfill its market potential.
Executives at Cambridge Silicon Radio believe they have stepped across one of the thresholds impeding Bluetooth's acceptance: pricing.
According to CSR, its new BlueCore02 chip will offer OEMs a CMOS-based radio, baseband, and microcontroller with a fully integrated Bluetooth software stack at the magic $5-per-chip price point.
"The use of RF-CMOS at 2.4 GHz is critical to reaching the cost targets through the elimination of specialized, expensive RF technology," said James Collier, technical director at CSR, Cambridge, England.
"Replacing this high-cost technology with mainstream CMOS IC processes, combined with the high level of integration and the minimization of external components that CSR is demonstrating, is the only implementation that can facilitate the widely accepted Bluetooth cost target," he said.
While acknowledging that Cambridge is "at the head of the pack," Jack Quinn, an analyst at Micrologic Research in Phoenix, said the company has more work to do before its technology becomes prevalent.
For example, "today, you can't go to a distributor and buy [Cambridge's] Bluetooth chip," Quinn said. "This makes it hard to do your development work if you're a small company."
But Allied Business Intelligence believes the lack of Cambridge and other Bluetooth designs will be short-lived. By the end of next year, Bluetooth chips will be used in such applications as mobile phones, notebooks, desktops, and printers, and will achieve sales of $967 million, according to the Oyster Bay, N.Y., research firm.
"The CMOS process appears to be the path to lowest cost, and CSR is a leader in this space," said Navin Sabharwal, an analyst at ABI.
Fujitsu Media Devices Ltd. recently developed an intelligent card based on CSR's Bluetooth CMOS product, which connects PCs, laptops, PDAs, and digital cameras. Other CSR customers include Alcatel, ALPS Electric, and Tochigi Mitsumi.
Cell phones offer a principal market for Bluetooth applications, according to Micrologic's Quinn.
"The cell-phone industry has much to gain from Bluetooth because it'll make the phones hands-free and thus less susceptible to regulation for use in automobiles," he said. "By removing the cell phone from the side of the user's head, Bluetooth may also lessen the public perception of the health risk from exposing the user's brain to the much higher levels of RF radiation that these phones emit when compared to a Bluetooth headset."
CSR will offer BlueCore02 samples in the first quarter of 2001, and ship the product in 64-pin BGA packages. |
