ROW International News Briefs

Industry ready for ZigBee revolution, says WTRSDemand for low data rate systems is expected to increase dramatically in the future as technologies such as ZigBee and others based on the 802.15.4 protocol hit the market, according to new research from West Technology Research Solutions LLC (WTRS). The research concludes in its report that the wireless communications industry faces a high risk of market fragmentation and that the market will likely be dominated by proprietary systems based on the 802.15.4 standard. WTRS maintains that ZigBee will attain standard status, but its impact in the marketplace will be lower than previously thought because of strategic maneuvres on the part of several companies. "The proliferation of proprietary 802.15.4 solutions in advance of the availability of the ZigBee standard has effectively marginalized the overall market opportunity for ZigBee," Kirsten West, a principal at WTRS, said in a news release announcing the research findings. WTRS predicts moderate growth in chipset shipments from 19 million units in 2006 to 123 million units in 2009, representing approximately 20% and 10% respectively of the overall 802.15.4 market forecast. "The ZigBee market forecast has been downgraded since the last update to reflect the risk of marketplace fragmentation that WTRS has identified, while maintaining a hold on the overall 802.15.4 forecast," reads the news release. For more information on the research, visit www.westtechnologyresearch.com. UWB devices to hit market in 2005, despite lack of standardUltra wideband (UWB) devices are set to hit the consumer electronics market next year, despite there being a lack of standards, which will help drive chipset shipments skyward over the next three years, according to high-tech research firm In-Stat/MDR. The American firm says that UWB node/chipset shipments will experience a compound annual growth rate of more than 400% from 2005 to 2008. Devices will start to appear on the market in 2005 based on proprietary chipsets from Freescale Seimconductor and General Atomics despite the lack of a standard. Many companies and consumer electronics companies aren’t waiting for the standards process to play itself out and they believe that stakes are too high not to release products now. The opportunities for UWB-enabled devices are attractive, and the research firm believes those lie in fast video transfer between peripheral devices such as digital camcorders, TVs and PCs, and between set-top boxes and TV sets. Demand for UWB will be substantial because of the inability of 802.11-based technologies to provide necessary bandwidth to support these types of applications. Additionally, there aren’t alternative standardized wireless technologies that can offer robust data transfer for these types of applications. Research shows business users want in-flight cell phone useNew research for ARINC and Telenor shows that nearly half of all business travelers would prefer to travel with an airline that allowed in-flight cell phone use. The conclusion comes from a survey of 1,200 international business and leisure travelers at London’s Heathrow and Gatwick airports, two of the world’s busiest centres. The two companies demonstrated an in-flight cell phone service at the World Airline Entertainment Association conference in Seattle last month. Many planes could be easily equipped to handle in-flight cell phone use because they already have the necessary equipment. Research was conducted in June and July by Inflight Management Development Centre, an independent U.K.-based management support services firm. Yankee Group says P2P MMS to lead revenueNew research from the Yankee Group says that peer-based multimedia messaging services (MMS) will replace similar peer SMS as the leading revenue generator by 2008. The high-tech research firm estimates that P2P MMS is experiencing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of more than 82%. "Multimedia-based entertainment services also enjoy a high CAGR (96.5%) and will become the top entertainment service revenue generator in 2005, surpassing text-based and browser-based entertainment services," reads a September 27 news release.

ROW International News Briefs

News | 10/05/2004 4:00 am EDT

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