Startup Wants to Give Embedded Systems Something to Wi-Fi About

ZeroG Wireless wants to create an Internet of things.

The article is not written clearly for me to get enough information on exactly where ZeroG wants to do this, but the idea smacks of building into wireless systems an ability for "things" like operations equipment and monitoring devices to operate across an 802.11b channel.

So, basically your office equipment, from a coffeepot to a copy machine operating without an OS on a wireless architecture. Hello, business and caffe latte by phone!

The company hopes to find design wins in a wide variety of embedded systems from coffee pots and toys to sensor networks in building and industrial automation. It estimates that market could amount to as many as nine billion sockets.

The company's ZG2100, built in 180nm process, supports up to 2Mbit/s data rates. It includes a baseband, media access controller, power amplifier and hardware acceleration for Wi-Fi security standards such as WEP, WPA and WPA2.

The chip uses a host controller to run part of its code. It requires as little as 367bytes of RAM and less than 10Kbytes of ROM from a host micro-controller, according to the company. It can run without an OS.

ZeroG will also ship the chip as part of a module, the ZG2100M, which includes required passives and an integrated antenna. The company has struck a partnership with Microchip Technology Inc. so that its module will support Microchip's existing Internet Protocol (IP) software, tools and development kits.

NYTIMES: Vancouver Building UP, UP, UP for the Olympics

Vancouver hosts the next Winter Olympics in four years. What's going on over there in the Great White North?

[ed. note: I've never been to Vancouver, but I have a free ticket that I can't wait to use to get there. I booked it this year in the hopes I can use it before the summer comes next year.]

Preening for the Olympics, Vancouver is Building Up

An excerpt:

There has been a lot of construction going on in Vancouver in preparation for the Games — and beyond. After the Winter Games, the 16-building Olympic Village, which will house about 2,800 athletes, is to be converted into a 730-unit luxury condominium complex called Millennium Water. About half the units have already been sold, Mr. Rennie said.

A two-bedroom, 1,113-square-foot condo on the fourth floor of a Millennium Water building on Ontario Street was listed last month for 855,900 Canadian dollars ($673,937 at 1.27 Canadian dollars to the U.S. dollar). Three one-bedroom units between 584 and 686 square feet in a building on West First Avenue were listed at 464,900 to 505,900 Canadian dollars. It is possible to put 10 percent down.

Although it is only 35 miles north of the border, Vancouver looks and feels different from any city in the United States or, for that matter, Canada. With its glass-and-steel towers crowding a sweeping harbor, it could be in Asia.

Asia, indeed. The carriers in Canada are building up, too, and it seems everyone is migrating to Vancouver, because customers from all around the world are goign to be setting their phones on roam as they ply the canyons of steel and glass.

Just a what, ten hour flight from Hong Kong, you can expect mobile phone use to be sky-high during the competition. If you can't get a signal in one of those hotels, what's the outcome going to be?

And it rarely snows in Vancouver, as the article mentions. Guess what that means for winter sports? They are going to be held indoors!

We've got a panel about the use of mobile devices inside of amenity buildings. I'd love for you to check it out. We are luck also to have the participation of Eric Yapp, from Rycom, and one of the most progressive Inbuilding thinkers at a carrier in Canada, Denis Stelatus, at Telus, to talk about this very kind of thinking: What needs to happen to make Inbuilding a win-win-win-win for everyone in property, carriers, and consumers, and integrators? Should be powerful stuff.


You can leave a comment or contact me for a look at the brochure, which will be published shortly. Send me your thoughts, too. Inbuilding Wireless is growing. Where will it go?

dcrets [at] iirusa [dot] com
Douglas Crets -- Director -- InBuilding Wireless Solutions, Las Vegas

Friday Tidbyte: The Usual Suspects, Mass Communicators

Every once in a while, I sit down and try to mull over what are the dominant and enticing thoughts that have dominated the Inbuilding Wireless Solutions market. Here's what I've come up with for this Friday's Tidbytes:

Cell phones used to be for the super rich. "What's that? AT&T at 42.50? Buy, you worm! Buy, buy, buy!"

But now, I don't think you can step into a subway car in Manhattan without seeing a cell phone or an iPhone in someone's hand.

And have you ever visited India?

Personal story: In the earlier hours of the morning, a driver picked me up to take me from New Delhi to the Taj Mahal in Agra, India, a good four or five hour drive away. Along the way, the four-wheel drive truck would swerve around donkeys, cattle, wagons filled to the sky with hay, as well as formers up to their dhotis in mud as they walked through the rice fields.

As we pulled up to the railroad crossing to enter into Agra, we were met by several men selling... mobile phones, calling cards, and other things. They had it figured out, boy. What's the first thing you are going to do when you see the beautiful Taj Mahal? Call your mother!

Great pitch!

The most beautiful mausoleum in the world, and a great place for taking cell phone pictures

And though it was not respectful to use phones to make calls inside the tomb, I did see people using phones to take pictures. Outside, looking over the Ganges River, an editor at Platts who attended the tour with us was using her phone to call someone.

The same thing is true at Angkor Wat. Everyone, and I mean everyone leading tour groups through the compound at Angkor Wat in Cambodia had a small Motorola phone in his or her hand. Tourists would snap pictures with their phones. I saw a man get hit by a truck and as he was being rushed to the clinic, his friend was sitting with him in the back of the same truck calling the medics on the phone while they sped away, honking the horn like a panicked lamb.

What does this mean?Mobile phone use is not only easy and affordable, it's becoming pervasive. It's used everywhere. Everywhere. If Rick Blaine in Casablanca had had a mobile phone, he would have been using it all the time in his club, and so would Renault. There would never be any of this having to telephone from the police station, "Round up the usual suspects!"

Inbuilding Wireless Solutions Las Vegas Powers Up

The IBWS 2009 is the antithesis of a dropped call.

It comes in crystal clear. It's easy to get to.

And you will always find the right person on the other end of the communication line.

Welcome to your network for the IBWS 2009. Keep coming back to learn how you can register to join international and domestic wireless carriers, progressive property developers and landlords, and the leaders in inbuilding wireless solutions around the world.