SiBeam, a developer of millimeter wave chipsets and platforms, has received a strategic investment from Panasonic and Samsung for the continued development of SiBeam’s WirelessHD semiconductor products, reports EE Times.
SiBeam’s CMOS chipsets operate in the 60-GHz band and transfer data at up to 4-Gbits per second. They are designed for the streaming of uncompressed and lossless high definition video, audio and data. SiBeam is also a founding member of the WirelessHD Consortium that includes several consumer electronics manufacturers, including both Panasonic and Samsung.
Wireless connections are expected to simplify A/V installations and allow more flexibility in positioning TVs. But there is no consensus among consumer manufacturers on a single standard. The leading contenders are:
- WirelessHD uses 60-GHz transmission. The bandwidth available at 60 GHz allows data transmissions as fast as 4 Gbits/s. The format is backed by lead technology developer SiBeam, along with Intel, LG, Panasonic, NEC, Samsung, Sony and Toshiba.
- Wireless High Definition Interface (WHDI), using 5 GHz. WHDI, developed by Israeli company Amimon, reportedly achieves a data rate as fast as 3 Gbits/s. WiFi 802.11n technology using MIMO can achieve up to 600 mbps, but cannot yield a 3-Gbit/s data rate. For that, Amimon tapped an existing signal-processing technology called joint-source channel coding.
- WiMedia Alliance uses Ultrawideband (UWB) in a band of frequencies from 4.2 to 4.8 GHz or higher. Their Wireless USB standard claims a data rate of 480 Mbits/s and works by compressing and expanding HD video images.
