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JULY 1st, 2005
Blue7 Communications, founded in 2002, has demonstrated its all CMOS UWB
Windeo chipset. The demonstration provided for uninterrupted wireless MPEG Video Streaming at 106.7 Mbps over a distance of
20 meters. In order to demonstrate the capability to transmit through common obstacles found in the home, the transmitter
and receiver were separated by two walls and a group of people. Applications for the company’s chip set includes DVD
players, Digital Cameras, HDTVs, PDAs and Set Top boxes.
JUNE 27th, 2005
FOCUS Enhancements, Inc. (NASDAQ: FCSE), through two separate arrangements
has obtained $4.2 million in commitments to assist the company in the development and marketing of its through-the-wall, wireless
home video transmission technology. The company secured $1.7 million through the private placement of 2.4 million new shares
of its common stock. The company also signed an eighteen month loan agreement valued at $2.5 million. That loan is an interest
only loan.
The company indicated that in addition to general use of the funds,
it also plans to expand the market for its FireStorm products and further develop its Ultra Wideband (UWB) chip technology.
According to Brett Moyer, CEO at FOCUS Enhancements, "These funding commitments complete our near-term financing goals and
provide added financial resources as we continue our solid progress on our strategic UWB initiative. Earlier this month we
announced the tape-out of the industry's first high-performance, 880 megabit per second (Mbps) wireless UWB chip, the first
of a two-part chipset solution, and the tape-out of the second chip is expected in September 2005. This financing allows FOCUS
Enhancements to invest further resources in providing a new generation of wireless-enabled, video-based consumer electronics
into the home, as well as further strengthening our Systems Business."
Moyer in his statements also projected revenue for the company’s
2005 year, "We are reiterating our previously stated financial outlook -- we currently expect full-year 2005 revenue to be
in the range of $25 million to $27 million, an increase of approximately 30 percent compared to the full-year 2004."
JUNE 14th, 2005
Artimi Brings Out its UWB Solution
Artimi Ltd. has announced that it has received its Ultra Wideband (UWB) chip, the RTMI-100,
from its foundry partner. The mixed signal chip, manufactured on a 0.18 micron SiGe BICMOS semiconductor process, integrates
a Low Noise Amplifier (LNA), power amplifier (PA), adaptive channel digital radio, a Media Access Controller (MAC), a PCI
2.3 interface and RISC IO processor.
The chip, with an 800Mbps transport capability, error correction
and encryption is planned for use in a number of networked consumer applications that involve streaming audio and video. As
well, the technology is expected to be eventually integrated into Bluetooth based applications.
With the announcement of the delivery, Colin Macnab, CEO of Artimi
summarized the commitment to low cost, standards based designs, "Our single-chip UWB device demonstrates Artimi's commitment
to providing the lowest cost complete UWB solutions. Our active participation in standards and industry groups, such as the
IEEE and WiMedia Alliance, will ensure future compatibility and interoperability of our UWB devices. In addition, our flexible
architecture will enable us to deliver a single chip MBOA compliant solution when the standard is finalized."
MAY 5th, 2005
FOCUS Enhancements, Inc.'s (NASDAQ: FCSE), through its semiconductor
group, has announced plans to sample its ultra wide band (UWB) chipsets in the third quarter of 2005 and modules with the
UWB chipsets later in the year. The company reported that performance expectations for the chipsets are in the range of 880
Megabits per second (Mbps) at 8 meters and 37 Mbps at 40 plus meters. The company has tested the chipset at its Hillsboro
Oregon facility for a networked HDTV application. In that test, the company was able to transmit two HDTV data streams through
the walls, indicating that the technology surpassed other UWB performance metrics. According to Mike Kelly, Vice President
of Marketing at FOCUS Enhancements' Semiconductor Group, "FOCUS has essentially doubled the Institute for Electrical and Electronic
Engineering's (IEEE's) targets of 110 Mbps at a distance of 10 meters. Other solutions fall short when trying to deliver sustained
high-resolution video over longer distances and are not very tolerant of things getting in the way of the signal. We are overcoming
these obstacles -- now with two HD streams through a wall -- and have something that is practical for use by consumers in
the home."
APRIL 8th, 2005
Wisair announced its second generation WiMedia-MBOA Radio Frequency
(RF) transceiver 502 chip intended for ultra wideband (UWB) applications. The pre-production chip is based on IBM's 0.18 micron
SiGe BiCMOS process technology. According to Teddy O'Connell, Manager for Business Development, IBM Systems & Technology
Group, Semiconductor Offerings, "IBM is pleased that Wisair has selected our 0.18um SiGe BiCMOS technology for their pre-production
UWB RF transceiver chip. This is the second successful RF chip that Wisair has developed using IBM SiGe technology and its
price, performance and model maturity enables Wisair to ship competitive UWB solutions to its customers."
The MB-OFDM standard compliant chip supercedes Wisair's first UWB
501 chip, which was shipped to over 35 customers in a variety of different end markets. The new 502 chip offers a number of
improvements over the first version. David Yaish, Wisair President and CEO explained, "In preparation towards our pre- production
phase we have developed a second generation proven performance silicon RF chip that is poised to help our customers significantly
reduce their power consumption and overall cost of UWB solutions. Our small die-size 502 RF chip is a fully integrated MB-OFDM
RF transceiver with less than 10 external passive components."
The 502 chip also supports two antennas simultaneously and both
MB-OFDM TFI and FFI modes. It operates in between 3.1 GHz and 4.8 GHz and has three sub-bands, each 528 MHz.
Wisair, founded in May 2001, was funded through investments from
APAX partners, Bynet VC, Intel, NIF, NTT Leasing, RAD VC, Tamar and Vertex. Wisair's target markets, which its addresses through
international offices in the USA, Japan, Korea and Taiwan, include the consumer electronics, PC, mobile and automotive industries.
Wisair has been active in the Wireless USB Promoters Group and the MB-OFDM standards process.
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