 | |
| Type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Semiconductors |
| Founded | 2003 |
| Headquarters | , USA |
Key people | David Shoemaker (CEO) |
| Website | www |
Alereon, Inc, is a fabless semiconductor company. It uses ultrawideband (UWB) radio technology to develop Certified Wireless USB and WiMedia Alliance-compliant UWB integrated circuits (ICs). Headquartered in Austin, Texas, Alereon also has offices in Korea and Hong Kong.
Alereon was spun off from Time Domain Corporation of Huntsville, Alabama, in August 2003 taking with it a number of engineers, executives, and patents from its parent company. An early investor was Austin Ventures. [1] Eric Broockman was the first company CEO in 2003. [2]
It initially backed the multi-band orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing approach taken by the MultiBand OFDM Alliance. [1] A number of competing technologies were discussed by the IEEE 802.15 standards committee in 2004. [3] In October 2005, $20 million in financing included investors Centennial Ventures and Pharos Capital. [4] After the IEEE effort was abandoned, the venture arm of Samsung Electronics invested $4 million in December 2006. [5] By 2009, Brookman was still chief executive [6] and stepped down in 2014 [7] to be replaced by David Shoemaker who was previously vice president of Engineering. [8] [9] In June 2012, an addition $6 million of funding was announced with investors Pharos Capital Partners and Duchossois Technology Partners and led by Enhanced Capital Partners. [10]
Alereon applies their UWB's in the areas of consumer, military and medical. Their technology covers a larger spectrum than WiFi does and provides more bandwidth for video. In the consumer area, the company works together with monitor and consumer electronics manufacturers for their wireless PC/laptop/tablet docking stations, their wireless monitors, wireless PC-to-HDTV video streaming devices, as well as wireless cable replacements for HDMI, DVI, VGA, USB, audio, and Ethernet. [11] [12] [13] Alereon provides chipsets, modules and software development kits (SDK) and tools. All of the UWB chipsets from Alereon consist of two chips, the AL5350B MAC/Baseband and the AL5100 RF Transceiver. [14] [15]
Ultra-wideband is a radio technology that can use a very low energy level for short-range, high-bandwidth communications over a large portion of the radio spectrum. UWB has traditional applications in non-cooperative radar imaging. Most recent applications target sensor data collection, precise locating, and tracking. UWB support started to appear in high-end smartphones in 2019.
Wireless USB (Universal Serial Bus) is a short-range, high-bandwidth wireless radio communication protocol created by the Wireless USB Promoter Group which intended to increase the availability of general USB-based technologies. It is unrelated to Wi-Fi, and different from the Cypress WirelessUSB offerings. It was maintained by the WiMedia Alliance which ceased operations in 2009. Wireless USB is sometimes abbreviated as WUSB, although the USB Implementers Forum discouraged this practice and instead prefers to call the technology Certified Wireless USB to distinguish it from the competing UWB standard.
Ralink Technology, Corp. is a Wi-Fi chipset manufacturer mainly known for their IEEE 802.11 chipsets. Ralink was founded in 2001 in Cupertino, California, then moved its headquarters to Hsinchu, Taiwan. On 5 May 2011, Ralink was acquired by MediaTek.
Qualcomm Atheros is a developer of semiconductor chips for network communications, particularly wireless chipsets. The company was founded under the name T-Span Systems in 1998 by experts in signal processing and VLSI design from Stanford University, the University of California, Berkeley, and private industry. The company was renamed Atheros Communications in 2000 and it completed an initial public offering in February 2004, trading on the NASDAQ under the symbol ATHR.
The Nintendo Wi-Fi USB Connector is a wireless game adapter, developed by Nintendo and Buffalo Technology, which allows the Nintendo DS, Wii and 3DS users without a Wi-Fi connection or compatible Wi-Fi network to establish an Internet connection via a broadband-connected PC. When inserted into the host PC's USB port, the connector functions with the Nintendo DS, Wii, DSi and 3DS, permitting the user to connect to the Internet and play Nintendo games that require a Wi-Fi connection and access various other online services. According to the official Nintendo website, this product was the best-selling Nintendo accessory to date on 15 November 2007, but was discontinued in the same month. On September 9, 2005, Nintendo announced the Nintendo Wi-Fi Network Adapter, an 802.11g wireless router/bridge which serves a similar purpose.
Microchip Technology Incorporated is a publicly listed American corporation that manufactures microcontroller, mixed-signal, analog, and Flash-IP integrated circuits. Its products include microcontrollers, Serial EEPROM devices, Serial SRAM devices, embedded security devices, radio frequency (RF) devices, thermal, power and battery management analog devices, as well as linear, interface and wireless products.
The WiMedia Alliance was a non-profit industry trade group that promoted the adoption, regulation, standardization and multi-vendor interoperability of ultra-wideband (UWB) technologies. It existed from about 2002 through 2009.
NXP Semiconductors N.V. (NXP) is a Dutch semiconductor designer and manufacturer with headquarters in Eindhoven, Netherlands. The company employs approximately 31,000 people in more than 30 countries. NXP reported revenue of $11.06 billion in 2021.
Pulse~LINK is a privately held fabless integrated circuit semiconductor corporation headquartered in Carlsbad, California, located just north of San Diego California, in the United States. Pulse~LINK commercializes ultra-wideband (UWB) technology, for both wireless and wired networks.
MediaTek Inc. is a Taiwanese fabless semiconductor company that provides chips for wireless communications, high-definition television, handheld mobile devices like smartphones and tablet computers, navigation systems, consumer multimedia products and digital subscriber line services as well as optical disc drives.
Wireless Home Digital Interface (WHDI) is a consumer electronic specification for a wireless HDTV connectivity throughout the home.
DisplayLink is a semiconductor and software technology company owned by Synaptics that develops the DisplayLink USB graphics technology. This technology enables computers and displays to connect using USB, Ethernet, and WiFi, and also allows for multiple displays to be connected to a single computer. DisplayLink's primary customers include notebook OEMs, LCD monitor manufacturers, and PC accessory vendors, and their technology is compatible with a wide range of operating systems, including Microsoft Windows, macOS, Android, ChromeOS, and Linux.
The Wireless Gigabit Alliance was a trade association that developed and promoted the adoption of multi-gigabit per second speed wireless communications technology "WiGig" operating over the unlicensed 60 GHz frequency band. The alliance was subsumed by the Wi-Fi Alliance in March 2013.
Icera Inc. is a British multinational fabless semiconductor company headquartered in Bristol, United Kingdom, and a wholly owned subsidiary of Nvidia Corporation. It has developed soft modem chipsets for the mobile devices market, including mobile broadband datacards, USB sticks, and embedded modems for smartphones, laptops, netbooks, tablets, e-books and other mobile broadband devices.
RUCKUS Networks is a brand of wired and wireless networking equipment and software owned by CommScope. Ruckus offers Switches, Wi-Fi access points, CBRS access points, Controllers, Management systems, Cloud management, AAA/BYOD software, AI and ML analytics software, location software and IoT controller software products to mobile carriers, broadband service providers, and corporate enterprises. As a company, Ruckus invented and has patented wireless voice, video, and data technology, such as adaptive antenna arrays that extend signal range, increase data rates, and avoid interference, providing distribution of delay-sensitive content over standard 802.11 Wi-Fi.
Sony Semiconductor Israel Ltd., formerly known as Altair Semiconductor, is an Israeli developer of high performance single-mode Long Term Evolution (LTE) chipsets. The company's product portfolio includes baseband processors, RF transceivers and a range of reference hardware products. Founded in 2005, Altair employs 190 employees in its Hod Hasharon, Israel headquarters and R&D center, and has regional offices in the United States, Japan, China, India, Finland, and France. Altair Semiconductor was the first chipset vendor to receive certification from Verizon Wireless to run on its 4G LTE network. Altair has also powered several devices launched on Verizon's network including the Ellipsis 7 tablet and HP Chromebook 11.6"LTE. In January 2016, it was announced that Sony was acquiring Altair for $212 Million. Altair was renamed Sony Semiconductor Israel on March 29, 2020.
IEEE 802.11ac-2013 or 802.11ac is a wireless networking standard in the IEEE 802.11 set of protocols, providing high-throughput wireless local area networks (WLANs) on the 5 GHz band. The standard has been retroactively labelled as Wi-Fi 5 by Wi-Fi Alliance.
Miracast is a wireless communications standard created by the Wi-Fi Alliance which is designed to transmit video and sound directly from devices to display receivers. It can roughly be described as "HDMI over Wi-Fi", replacing cables in favor of wireless. The protocol is utilised in many devices and is used or branded under various names by different manufacturers, including Smart View and AllShare Cast, SmartShare, screen mirroring, Cast, wireless display and screen casting.
Sequans Communications is a fabless semiconductor company that designs, develops, and markets integrated circuits ("chips") and modules for 4G and 5G cellular IoT devices. The company is based in Paris, France with offices in the United States, United Kingdom, Israel, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, Finland and China. The company was founded as a société anonyme in October 2003 by Georges Karam. It originally focused on the WiMAX market and expanded to the LTE market in 2009, dropping WiMAX altogether in 2011. Today the company develops and delivers only LTE chips and modules for the global 5G/4G cellular IoT market. Sequans was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in April 2011. Karam is the company's CEO.
Valens Semiconductor (Valens) is an Israeli fabless manufacturing company providing semiconductors for the automotive and audio-video industries. Valens provides semiconductor products for the distribution of uncompressed ultra-high-definition (UHD) multimedia content and in-vehicle connectivity applications. The company is a member of the MIPI Alliance and developed the first-to-market chipset that is compliant with the MIPI A-PHY standard. Valens invented the technology behind the HDBaseT standard and is a co-founder of the HDBaseT Alliance.
 | This computer hardware article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
 | This United States manufacturing company–related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |