Broadcom combo chips drive adoption of Bluetooth low energy wireless in mobile devices

IRVINE, USA: Broadcom Corp. announced that its latest generation Bluetooth combination chip is compliant with the ratified Bluetooth low energy version of the Bluetooth technology specification.

The Bluetooth low energy specification, which the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) ratified yesterday, enables an ultra-low power implementation of Bluetooth technology, making the technology increasingly applicable for wireless medical and fitness monitoring devices that necessitate very long battery life.

With Broadcom's dual-mode implementation, OEMs can extend these new Bluetooth low energy applications to smartphones and other devices while also enabling a wide array of existing popular Bluetooth functions with a single chip, paving the way for the new Bluetooth low energy version of the specification to gain broad adoption in consumer electronics products.

Highlights/Key facts:
* The Bluetooth SIG has ratified the Bluetooth low energy Specification, enabling a new wave of Bluetooth applications that connect devices with extremely stringent power requirements, including monitoring devices that use very small batteries.

* The ease with which Bluetooth low energy can be added into cell phones and PCs will help consolidate the market for low energy devices from a handful of proprietary technologies to Bluetooth low energy, which benefits from an installed base of billions of existing Bluetooth devices.

* Broadcom was an early supporter of low energy technology and has been a leading contributor to the Bluetooth SIG Specification Working Group, consistently delivering test platforms to drive the process forward.

* Broadcom's Bluetooth low energy product offering includes extensive hardware and software innovations that will be made available across many of the company's Bluetooth products over the coming year. The first Bluetooth low energy offering will be the Broadcom InConcert BCM2049 Bluetooth combo chip that supports Bluetooth low energy dual-mode operation and is a cost effective, high performance solution that enables mobile phone manufacturers to extend the user experience of their handset products to the coming wave of Bluetooth low energy devices.

* Dual-mode chips provide both standard Bluetooth functionality, as well as Bluetooth low energy functionality with the same solution. Competing, non dual-mode devices will require two separate chips to provide both Bluetooth low energy and standard Bluetooth functionality, which increases cost, area and power consumption when integrating the new technology.

* In support of the Bluetooth low energy specification, Broadcom has developed additional software profiles to support sensors as a feature of its software stack. Once this, and other Bluetooth low energy profiles have been formally defined and approved by the SIG, Broadcom will be able to make them quickly available to its OEM partners.

* Broadcom is fully committed to support all Bluetooth low energy features and operation modes in future Bluetooth product offerings.