Ember, a leading provider of low-power wireless mesh networking systems, will end 2008 with a flourish, setting company records for product shipments and revenue.
Building on the foundation from the previous year, Ember has shipped a record quantity of its ZigBee/802.15.4 semiconductors in 2008, more than all the previous years combined. This achievement reflects its position as a dominant vendor of ZigBee technology. It also validates the market acceptance of ZigBee as the wireless standard of choice for sensor and control networks, particularly for applications impacting energy management such as smart metering, as well as in home control and hospitality.
“ZigBee has emerged as the de facto standard for low-power wireless networking and is now a mature and proven technology,” said Ember CEO Bob LeFort. “Ember’s success in 2008 is evidence of ZigBee’s success. With a world class team, laser like focus on getting customers to market and our position as the clear ZigBee leader, we are confident of continuing this momentum in 2009 – the 5th year anniversary of ZigBee’s standards ratification.”
Smart Metering Momentum
Ember continued to see significant momentum in 2008 in the Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) market. 2009 looks to be even more promising as the U.S. focuses on a more energy-efficient economy and utilities roll out ZigBee enabled smart meters. A December 3, 2008 New York Times article noted: “President-elect Barack Obama and leaders in Congress are fashioning a plan to pour billions of dollars into a jobs program to jolt the economy and lay the groundwork for a more energy-efficient one…including the installation of ‘smart meters’ to monitor and reduce home energy use.”
As an enabler of smart meters, Ember is at the heart of such initiatives in the US and around the world. Ember enjoys a dominant position in the ZigBee market and recently introduced the Smart Energy Suite (SES), a collection of embedded software, tools and silicon that dramatically simplifies the delivery of devices such as smart meters, in home displays and climate controls that are certified to the ZigBee Alliance’s Smart Energy (SE) Profile. The SE Profile defines the standard behaviors of secure, easy-to-use, Home Area Network (HAN) devices, which are critical components of AMI deployments.
Ember has been working with AMI and HAN industry leaders within the ZigBee Alliance to accelerate delivery of Smart Energy Profile Certified products. As many as 14 vendors have recently certified products based on the ZigBee SE Profile including 11 Ember customers: Computime Limited; Comverge; Energate; Greenbox Technology; Itron; Landis+Gyr; LS Industrial Systems, Co., LTD; National Technical Systems (NTS); PRI; Tendril and Trilliant.
New Ember Tools Simplify ZigBee Development
In addition to the Smart Energy Suite, Ember also introduced in 2008 new versions of its ZigBee development tools enabling users to create functionally rich, high-performance applications within the confines of the EM250, Ember’s fully-integrated, ZigBee system-on-chip (SoC). The Ember InSight Desktop 2.0, xIDE 2.0 Development Environment and Ember AppBuilder development and debugging tools offer new features for users to further speed and simplify development of even the most sophisticated ZigBee PRO applications.
Hospitality Starts Leveraging ZigBee
The value proposition of ZigBee wireless technology to greatly increase comfort and convenience while dramatically reducing energy waste has not been lost on the hospitality industry. Hospitality establishments typically experience tremendous inefficiencies in energy management with huge financial implications, especially in the current economic environment. Ember’s ZigBee platform was deployed extensively in 2008, both in Europe and the United States, to not only improve energy management in buildings and guest rooms but also to help with lighting control, climate control, door locks, media control, mini bar management, and security of in room safes. These implementations spanned the hospitality spectrum from hotel value chains to the most luxurious hotels with thousands of rooms.
Partnership Developments
Ember further expanded its strong eco-system by partnering with several strategic partners in 2008 including Certicom, to provide strong network security using powerful elliptic curve cryptography; Skyworks Solutions, Inc., to develop the industry’s first portfolio of ZigBee front-end modules (FEM); and CalAmp Corp., to enable ZigBee and IP-based wireless networks to work together for automated meter reading, peak energy demand response and other Smart Grid applications.
2008 Distinctions
Ember’s chip/networking stack platform was once again designated as a “Golden Unit” for IEEE 802.15.4 / ZigBee PRO interoperability testing. Ember was also recognized by GigaOm, an influential technology blog, as a wireless company to watch for its innovative approach to changing the energy landscape and was named to the 2009 M2M 100 list by M2M Magazine which honors the most influential providers of machine-to-machine technology.
ZigBee: Wireless Control That Simply Works
The ZigBee Alliance is 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 ZigBee Alliance is a rapidly growing, non-profit industry consortium of leading semiconductor manufacturers, technology providers, OEMs, and end-users worldwide. Membership is open to all. Additional information can be found at http://www.zigbee.org.
About Ember Corporation
Ember Corporation develops ZigBee wireless networking technology that enables companies involved in energy technologies – enertech – to help make buildings and homes smarter, consume less energy, operate more efficiently, and keep people comfortable and safe. Ember’s low-power wireless technology can be embedded into a wide variety of devices to be part of a self-organizing mesh network. Ember is headquartered in Boston and has its radio development center in Cambridge, England, and distributors worldwide. The company is a promoter and Board member of the ZigBee Alliance and its platform is the “Golden Suite” for 802.15.4/ZigBee interoperability testing. For more information, please visit http://www.ember.com.
