NXP Semiconductors Enables Concurrent Bluetooth and Wireless LAN Connectivity

By: STEPHEN LAS MARIAS, EDITOR
( 1 Jul 2007 )

Wireless Design and Development Asia recently spoke with Renzo Pellandini, International Product Marketing Director, NXP Semiconductors, regarding the latest developments with the company. He also talked about the mobile telecom trends and applications to watch for in Asia, the Nexperia cellular system solution 5210 and the 7210 with Linux for 3G handsets, the R&D activities of the company. Excerpts:

What are some of your latest developments?
The technologies we are looking at are 3G, Wireless LAN, and Bluetooth. One of our latest developments is the Nexperia cellular system solution 5210, which will enable UMA-enabled devices to switch seamlessly between cellular networks and Wi-Fi hotspots, automatically detecting the fastest and most cost-effective network, and reducing phone bills and increasing network coverage During the initial stages, this was just wireless LAN UMA. But we see Bluetooth penetration continuing to increase. So we need to provide a solution which enable products like the UMA phones which are also capable of having Bluetooth handsets. Bluetooth and wireless LAN are conflicting from a frequency point of view, because they are running on the same frequency band. So the work design on the 5210 from the start has been to find a way that they can interact with one another and not interfere. We integrated a complex set of coexistence algorithms into the 5210¡¯s baseband¡ªour low-power BGW211 WLAN and Bluetooth solutions¡ªenabling both connectivity functions to operate simultaneously without interference. The 5210 now is already in mass production, and is available for Samsung and Sony Ericsson. They¡¯ve already brought a number of models.

As for Linux running on a 3G network, this emphasizes our work and the importance of supporting an open OS platform in this part of the world. I am seeing an increase in the number of development centers focused on open source software development. Our move toward Linux was an easy one, as it did not require significant changes and it¡¯s a very stable platform to run on.

Please elaborate on your R&D activities in China.
Our R&D group in China mainly focuses on the Asian market¡ªthe goal of the Asia team is to transfer the technology from Europe and provide dedicated products for the Asian market. We pass the knowledge base to the Shanghai team, and then it adopts the technology applications to be used and rolled out across our customer base. The goal for the team in Shanghai and the system team in Europe is to validate the interoperability of solutions between wireless LAN and Bluetooth within a GSM environment. Right now, the team in China is planning to do an interoperability test in Malaysia and Indonesia to make sure we don¡¯t encounter any issues.

What developments are we expecting from the mobile telecom industry in Asia this year?
I see there are a lot of big strides being taken toward new telecom technologies such as 3G, EDGE. In my view, this is stronger in Asia than other places in the world, as we have more applications now than we ever had before.

In Asia, there is an incredible trend towards full featured cell phones¡ªwhich bring a lot of quality media. And among the most predictable trend for mobile phones this year is the increasing size of the screen. The viewing of images with larger screens will be a key trend, and these larger screens will probably be the prevailing norm for 2008 onwards.

Which applications do you expect will drive this trend?
TV-on-mobile. Viewing images on your TV at home is a much better user experience, but many people are spending a lot of time traveling, particularly in China. It takes me over one hour to travel in Shanghai. And people are willing to compromise the quality that you can get on the road for quick access to information. So in my view for this year, there will be a significant focus on screen display. Larger display for the digitalization of mobile TV and gaming applications, which are well received in Asia, will bring new applications to customers.

Digital TV is coming but it¡¯s not yet available at the handset level. In recent exhibitions in Shenzhen, Beijing and Shanghai, I saw not only many operators talking about DVB-H and TV-on-mobile applications, but also there is a strong interest in the customer and consumer base towards this kind of application. Again, there are many people around the world who are always on the move, so consumer needs will drive demand for this segment. Moving one step ahead, many people also want to experience good quality of display so that they don¡¯t get tired after staring at a small screen for 5 minutes. They might download a movie on the phone¡ªbut if the quality is not good, their eyes will become tired and irritated.

How did you address this area?
The solution we proposed in this area¡ªthe PNX4150 with our patented Mobile Pixel Plus and Mobile Natural Motion technologies¡ªis the combination of viewing technology for TV-on-mobile, and the chipset with a combination of our mature device architecture. The combination of the two makes us quite unique as compared with our competitors, which may have very high expertise in one area but may not in another. Our research team is very large, providing different kinds of technical expertise, together with the know-how from consumers and our heritage from Philips that we can profit from.

We are able to provide state-of-art technology and better customization as we have strong know-how and expertise in consumers.