Adaptive frequency hopping aids office Bluetooth

Edited by the Electronicstalk editorial team Nov 30, 2001

Bandspeed and Open Interface North America have codeveloped the first product to use adaptive frequency hopping technology to allow Bluetooth enabled devices to coexist with wireless LANs.

Bandspeed and Open Interface North America (Open Interface) have codeveloped the first product to use adaptive frequency hopping (AFH) technology to allow Bluetooth-enabled devices to coexist with wireless LANs.

The companies will unveil the solution, based on Bandspeed's AFH HubMaster technology and Open Interface's BlueMagic AFH protocol stack, at the 2001 Bluetooth Developers Conference, which begins on the 11th December 2001 in San Francisco.

Bandspeed's adaptive frequency hopping (AFH) technology enables the noncollaborative coexistence of Bluetooth-enabled devices with WLANs such as 802.11b.

Open Interface's BlueMagic protocol stack integrated with Bandspeed's chipset creates a complete AFH coexistence solution for hardware manufacturers and OEMs.

BlueMagic AFH is backwards compatible with Open Interface's Bluetooth specification version 1.1 and works with existing Bluetooth wireless devices.

"A leading barrier to widespread adoption of Bluetooth is its inability to coexist with wireless LANs because of signal interference", said Michael Luther, chief executive officer, Bandspeed.

"By integrating our chipset with Open Interface's protocol stack, developers can be assured that their Bluetooth-enabled products will not interfere with wireless LANs or Wi-Fi networks".

"This can represent a milestone in the adoption of Bluetooth-related technologies and products", said Joyce Putscher, director, consumer/converging markets and technologies group at Cahners In-Stat.

"Peaceful coexistence means that WLANs won't have to be concerned with interference and degraded performance, and Bluetooth, with its low cost and low power consumption capabilities, can viably provide cableless device connectivity".

"The support for Bandspeed's AFH technology in Open Interface's Bluetooth protocol stack enables companies to quickly evaluate the performance improvements from AFH on Windows 2000 and XP systems", said Hiroshi Onaka, vice chairman of Open Interface North America.

"This is another example of Open Interface's commitment to provide OEMs with the best tools and support for developing Bluetooth enabled solutions".

A fully functional demonstration of the Bandspeed Hubmaster/Open Interface coexistence solution will take place at the Bluetooth Developers Conference (booth 219) in San Francisco 11th-13th December 2001.