All on the same wavelength; Ian Ansdell reveals how the mobile phones of the future will be able to 'talk' to a wide range of other electronic devices
Source: The Herald
Publication date: 2000-12-01
Arrival time: 2000-12-02
It could be an ad in one of those mail-order catalogues for daft products you never see in the shops: "Say goodbye to cable hell! Picture the luxury of a wire-free home - no more tangles, no more tears." The global tech community isn't quite talking in those terms, but that's the raison d'etre of the "next big thing".
Bluetooth had two significant merits from the outset. The first is its memorable name, derived from Harald Bluetooth, the Danish king who unified Denmark and Norway in the tenth century. The second is the way it was unleashed on the world - its conception took place in the labs of Swedish firm Ericsson, who realised its potential could only be maximised through open development and therefore released it as a royalty-free specification in 1998.
Defining Bluetooth isn't so straightforward. Put succinctly, it's a low-cost, low-power, radio-based wireless link, replacing cable to enable a wide range of electronic devices to communicate with each other. In practice it will link mobile computers, phones, and other portable hand-held devices, and enable consumers to connect to the internet, without a length of flex in sight.
Users of cellular phones, pagers, and personal digital assistants such as the PalmPilot will be able to buy a three-in-one phone that can double as a portable phone at home or in the office, synchronise quickly with information in a desktop or notebook computer, initiate the sending or receiving of a fax, initiate a print-out, and, in general, have all mobile and fixed computer devices totally co- ordinated.
"In very simple terms," says Ericsson, "there are two main technologies within the Bluetooth specification. It houses a radio transmitter/receiver which allows devices to talk to each other and the underlying networking logic which allows radio communication to be meaningful."
Almost three years after its liberation, Bluetooth's development is being driven by a special interest group (SIG) comprised of almost 2000 telecommunications, computing, and network companies worldwide, including heavy-hitters like Intel, IBM, 3Com, and Ericsson itself, each of whom previewed devices based on the specification at the recent Comdex show in Las Vegas. Some 670 million products will be using Bluetooth wireless technology by 2005, according to market researchers Cahners In-Stat Group, while another forecaster, Micrologic Research of Phoenix, puts the figure at 1.1 billion. Cell phones are expected to account for 42% of early sales and PCs 21%.
Changing the face of communications has global ramifications, and some of the benefits are being driven from Scotland. Operating from the $30m Livingston Design Centre opened by the Queen last June, a team of 55 engineers at the Tality Corporation, which employs 1,100 worldwide, is leading the development of tiny system-on-a-chip (SOC) modules which will be crucial to many applications. With demand for Bluetooth connectivity design expertise vastly outstripping supply, Tality is in a position to reduce manufacturers' development costs and time to market, and their designs have already been licensed by a dozen major customers. Some of the Livingston engineers also helped to create for Ericsson the Bluetooth Developers' Kit - a platform which enables other companies to develop the protocol.
Bluetooth is proving to be good for the future of Silicon Glen as well as its present. Most of the Livingston-based engineers are Scots, and in a sponsorship deal with Edinburgh University worth $500,000, Tality is now offering eight-month paid internships to top electrical engineering students during the fifth year of their courses. "We selected the University of Edinburgh for this program because its electrical engineering department is the highest-rated in Scotland," says Colin Adams, Tality vice-president and general manager of the Livingston design centre.
"By offering mentoring, on-the-job design training, and financial assistance to high-achieving students, we can help them reach their potential more quickly. In addition, we effectively increase the number of qualified candidates for engineering positions at Tality when they graduate from the university."
MeanWHILe, the race is on to reduce Bluetooth's costs to viable levels. At a recent conference in Edinburgh, designers said the cost per implementation had been driven to less than $10 - still some way off the target of $5 per module for PCs and $1 for wireless handsets. But Ericsson is about to go to market with three products - a lightweight, wireless mobile-phone headset, an adapter which enables a mobile phone to transmit voice and data to the headset, and a mobile phone. This will combine general packet radio services, high- speed data and wireless application protocol for internet access with a Bluetooth chip which removes the need for cables between the phone and other mobile devices or PCs.
Publication date: 2000-12-01
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