Spreadtrum selects CSR connectivity and Location for smartphone reference designs

Mobile World Congress 2012, BARCELONA, SPAIN: CSR plc announced that Spreadtrum Communications Inc., a Chinese fabless semiconductor company, has chosen CSR plc to provide wireless connectivity and location technologies for the Spreadtrum SC8805G TD-SCDMA and SC6810 EDGE/WIFI low cost smartphone reference designs in order to meet market demand in China and emerging markets for internet access, data transfer, and location.

Specifically, CSR will provide its CSR6027 Wi-Fi solution, the SiRFstarIV location platform and Bluetooth for the reference designs. This is an extension to CSR’s relationship with Spreadtrum on feature phone platforms on which CSR connectivity, location and Bluetooth technologies are already in volume shipment.

“Spreadtrum has been instrumental in helping Chinese manufacturers to capitalise on the smartphone revolution by offering low-cost, easy-to-integrate processors and reference designs that speed time-to-market for wireless communication products,” said Ahmet Alpdemir, senior VP, CSR's Mobile Business Group “We view this partnership as an excellent way to continue to expand our market presence in China and other emerging markets for cost effective smartphones.”

Part of CSR’s UniFi product line, CSR6027/6030 is a WAPI-qualified version for the Chinese market of the CSR6026single-chip solution delivering Wi-Fi 802.11n support for mobile embedded devices such as smartphones. The product provides manufacturers with low-cost, high performance Wi-Fi support without compromising battery life or space. CSR6027 offers a PowerSave feature ensuring that mobile devices can achieve optimal battery life, and offers a very small system footprint and very low eBom (electronic bill of materials), enabling easy integration into mobile devices.

SiRFstarIV is the market-leading location platform, now deployed in hundreds of consumer products worldwide, offering high acquisition and tracking performance and accuracy, low battery consumption, and active jammer removal. These features will bring to consumers of SC8805G and SC6810-enabled devices the ability to get a position fix with optimal speed, in varying conditions such as under dense foliage or in urban canyons, with very low battery consumption.