UWB Future Questioned as Standard Group Shutters
Analysts predicted a gloomy future for Ultra-wideband (UWB) after the main UWB standard group WiMedia Alliance announced its disbanding late Monday. The move came after the closing down of several UWB suppliers and application firms. The standard group’s activities will be handed off to the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG), the Wireless USB Promoter Group and the USB Implementer’s Forum.
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WiMedia blamed the amount of overlap among the standards bodies, multiple certifications, and the fact that travel to similar meetings strained member resources, said Steven Wood, president of the group. The wireless technology has reached its maturity and it’s time to start simplifying how the industry is structured, he said. Specifications are unlikely to diverge given the overlap in member company participation among the respective trade groups, WiMedia said. Approvals of current platforms that have already been certified will remain in effect until the expiration date.
Analysts disagreed, citing market failures. If UWB was successful, the WiMedia Alliance wouldn’t be shutting down, said In-Stat’s Brian O'Rourke. UWB has never gained much traction partly due to relatively high price and the lack of urgent uses, he said. The technology, which is designed for high-speed transfers of data, especially multimedia content, and is designed to be much faster than Wi-Fi and consumes much less power, isn’t the problem, he said. Caroline Gabriel of research firm Rethink agreed, saying WiMedia demonstrations have “fallen well short of their targets,” delivering slower speeds than many Wi-Fi networks, while more successful implementations have come from small independent players, which haven’t yet achieved the major industry partners necessary to infiltrate the consumer electronics mainstream. Analysts also argued that UWB capabilities have been limited by regulatory restrictions, industry in- fighting, and the rapid progress of high speed Wi-Fi in key UWB target markets.
Several WiMedia start-ups have already closed down, especially since Intel and Texas Instruments de-focused on UWB, Gabriel said. TZero, WiQuest and Focus Enhancements shut their doors over the past six months, while Artimi merged with Staccato. The two major remaining start-ups are Alereon and Staccato.
Staccato CEO Marty Colombatto defended the technology, saying the slow adoption hasn’t been a demand issue. It’s a supply problem related to available solutions, he said. He underlined that Intel didn’t abandon UWB even though the company closed its UWB Networking Operations. This is typical of Intel for its non-core businesses, he said. Colombatto’s bullish about the outlook this year because major barriers to mass adoption, such as the lack of approved spectrum and initial technical limitations, were removed. Wood also saw a positive future, saying he expects two waves of offerings. The first wave is related to the “aesthetics of cables on the desktops,” he said. The second wave of applications relates to the connection of the PC, TV and the handheld devices, he said. A market activation price point around $5 must be reached before the waves start, he said. Chips initially entered the market at $20 and today they are at $6 -$7, he said.