The U.S. Military Offers $2 Million For Wireless Devices That Can Share The Airwaves
Wi-Fi is usually fine at home, but can be a nightmare to use at a packed convention, café, or park. A big enough crowd can kill cell reception too. It's common to hear people say something along the lines of, "The Wi-Fi sucks here."
In truth, Wi-Fi sucks everywhere there is a crowd not because there are too many radio waves in the air, but because wireless devices aren't making good use of them, according to Paul Tilghman, a program manager at the U.S. military's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
DARPA, which helped build the wired Internet, now aims to fix the wireless net with its Spectrum Collaboration Challenge, nicknamed SC2. Kicking off in 2017, it's a competition for up to 30 teams of engineers to develop wireless devices that work together to better share the airwaves. Using artificial intelligence will be key to the process, and the team that nails it will win $2 million. The second-place team takes home $1 million, and third place brings in $750,000. This is the latest in the agency's Grand Challenges, a series of contests for developing technologies with military and civilian benefits that have yielded robots, self-driving cars, and automated network security systems.
fastcompany.com
|
