Ember™ Corporation, provider of embedded wireless networking solutions, today announced a development partnership with Chipcon AS (www.chipcon.com), a leading developer of high-performance radio frequency (RF) integrated circuits. The partnership will produce a family of extremely low power, highly integrated RFICs and SoCs (System on a Chip) from 300Mhz to 2.4Ghz, tailored for sensing and control applications across many markets.
“This is another important step for Ember toward becoming a standard for embedded wireless networking. Jointly designing and manufacturing RFICs and SoCs with one of the best chipmakers in the industry puts us at a new place on the competitive map,” said Jeff Grammer, CEO of Ember. “Our best of breed embedded networking software, EmberNet, and our expert tools and guidance ensure that these upcoming products will provide our customers with low-cost, low-power embedded wireless networking in an integrated package. Customers looking for 802.15.4 standards and Zigbee-ready products will not be disappointed, either.”
The EmberNet embedded networking software utilizes a mesh network routing algorithm, creating extremely resilient, self-organizing and self-healing networks, with very low power requirements and no single point of failure.
“Ember is changing the face of wireless networking, and we are proud to be a part of that. We are excited to work with Ember toward a common goal of making very easy, inexpensive embedded wireless available inside everyone’s products,” said Geir Forre, Chipcon’s CEO. “Chipcon’s ‘Right the First Time’ commitment to producing excellent high-performance integrated circuits in record time will allow Ember to focus on what they do best.”
Well-suited for industrial, defense, building automation, and supply chain management environments and applications, EmberNet devices automatically route traffic around the typical interference found in harsh RF settings, resulting in increased flexibility in installation, maintenance and operation.
“This is the opening salvo in the fight for market leadership in the rapidly emerging low rate wireless market, and appears to be squarely on target. Chipcon and Ember have very complementary strengths and have already been out in front of the low rate wireless market in terms of actual deployment,” said Ian McPherson, principal analyst with Wireless Data Research Group. “A combination of the Chipcon SOC and the Ember protocol stack should be formidable competition for both proprietary and standards-based solutions. There are three key elements to winning in the LR WPAN space; low cost of acquisition, fault-tolerant network connectivity and an easily integrated platform. This partnership has the potential to surpass customer expectations on all three accounts.”
Some of these products are available immediately, and Ember will soon announce additional solutions from this partnership that will be integrated into sensing and control products offered by several of Ember’s key customers in the industrial automation, defense, and utility monitoring space.
About Ember Corporation
Ember removes the barriers to embedded networking. Ember’s self-organizing, self-healing, wireless mesh technology is uncompromisingly robust, easy to use, and flexible. The EmberNet networking platform gives forward-thinking companies the means to create products that do more by communicating better.
Headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, Ember Corporation is a privately held company with investments from Polaris Venture Partners, GrandBanks Capital, Dr. Robert Metcalfe, DFJ New England, Stata Venture Partners, RRE Ventures and DFJ ePlanet and is focused on enhancing sensing and control products through wireless connectivity. More information is available at www.ember.com.
