Motorola to Demonstrate Wireless Networking Technology May 28, 2003

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According to information released yesterday, Motorola, Inc. is in the process of delivering hardware and software samples to its development partners in support of the draft IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) 802.15.4 Standard. The standard is reportedly being driven by an association of companies working together to enable reliable, cost-effective, low-power, wirelessly networked monitoring and control products based on an open global standard. The association is calling itself the ZigBee Alliance. Motorola reports that the hardware and software will be demonstrated at the ZigBee Alliance European Open House, which will be held June 3, 2003 in Berlin, Germany.

The company’s MAC (Medium Access Control)/PHY (Physical Layer) 802.15.4 solution is reportedly designed to support the global 2.4-GHz band at data rates up to 250 kbps over air. The company says that the PHY is enabled with a radio frequency (RF) transceiver data modem. The system features an on-chip power management circuit that can manage power sources from 2.0 to 3.6 V, a power amplifier integrated into the transceiver, a low-noise amplifier (LNA) with filtering, and is engineered to support multiple power-down states.

With MAC code offered for use with many of Motorola’s microcontrollers, the company reports that a customer can add 802.15.4 wireless networking to existing applications by adding the RF modem and porting the MAC code to embedded controllers within their system.

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