GigaOm's title says it all: "The Wi-Fi Juggernaut Rolls on, Crushing Startups": Stacey Higginbotham writes that the cooperative agreement between the Wi-Fi Alliance and WiGig Alliance to harmonize 60 GHz wireless networking standards spells doom, despair, and agony for any competing efforts.
For Ars Technica in February 2009, I looked at what was once six and had settled to three competing approaches for wireless high-definition video.
Since then, UWB dropped out as a competitive offering for wireless high-def, and that left us with just Amimon's WHDI, which works in 5 GHz, and SiBeam's 60 GHz flavor standardized under WirelessHD.
I have been dubious about WHDI, because it relies on organized degradation to push through gigabits per second over a medium that should be able to carry no more than 600 Mbps with today's networking technology. Amimon is clever, but clever don't necessarily feed the bulldog.
SiBeam, however, should be able to deliver a complementary technology to the WiGig/Wi-Fi effort; WiGig and Wi-Fi aren't looking at wireless video, but at PC and consumer electronics networking.
On a related note, Dana Blankenhorn at ZDNet says that "governments...must approve use of the frequency spectrum" in 60 GHz, which is incorrect. Many regulators, including the FCC, have already approved large swaths of unlicensed use in 60 GHz. The real issue among different countries and regulatory domains is the amount of 60 GHz bandwidth, not whether it's available.
Update: I received a press release later in the morning trumpeting chipset figures. "Amimon announced it has surpassed half a million units in chipset sales and orders." Sales and orders . Huh. "Also, Amimon will pass the 1 million chipset sales milestone by Holiday Season of this year." Sales predictions .
Atom Feed (xml)