Wireless Industry Leaders Promote Next-Generation Wi-Fi Technology to Accelerate IEEE Standards Development

Wireless Industry Leaders Promote Next-Generation Wi-Fi Technology to Accelerate IEEE Standards Development

Twenty six Wi-Fi* industry leaders today announced a coalition formed to accelerate the IEEE* 802.11n standard development process and promote a technology specification for next-generation wireless local area networking (WLAN) products. By introducing a specification with widespread industry support, the Enhanced Wireless Consortium (EWC) hopes to speed ratification of an 802.11n standard, while enabling an ecosystem of high-performance WLAN products built to a common set of guidelines. This widely adopted specification will benefit consumers by, among other things, ensuring the interoperability of next-generation wireless products across a variety of brands and platforms.

The Enhanced Wireless Consortium has developed a specification that is designed to enable consumers to enjoy new levels of wireless performance, coverage and interoperability prior to ratification of an 802.11n standard. The EWC specification defines technologies that address the PC and networking equipment market, as well as emerging handheld and consumer electronic applications. The consortium has designed its specification to support speeds of up to 600 Mbps, and is considering the inclusion of other advanced technologies – including Space Time Block Coding (STBC) and beamforming – that will enable systems to deliver greater range for wireless products across multiple market segments and support advanced multimedia applications.

The EWC will make its draft product specification available for public download and will provide implementation rights to all silicon suppliers and system vendors who join the organization. Among the current members are Airoha*, Apple*, Atheros*, Azimuth*, Broadcom*, Buffalo*, Cisco Systems*, Conexant*, D-Link*, Intel Corporation, Lenovo*, Linksys*, LitePoint*, Marvell*, Metalink*, NETGEAR*, Ralink*, Realtek*, SANYO*, Sony*, Symbol Technologies*, Toshiba*, USRobotics*, WildPackets*, Winbond* and ZyDAS*. If the EWC specification is ratified by the IEEE, EWC members have agreed to make their relevant intellectual property (IP) available to all parties on reasonable and non-discriminatory (RAND) terms. For additional information about the Enhanced Wireless Consortium and a complete listing of member companies, please visit www.enhancedwirelessconsortium.org.

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