WiMedia Becomes Wireless USB Standard

By Angela Natividad | Published Mar 20, 2007

Ecma International, gatekeepers of the ISO format, just accepted WiMedia as an ISO standard. This puts the WiMedia ultra-wideband protocol on the same plane as, well, PDF, for example.

The transition makes WiMedia the de jure standard for radio platform ultra-wideband wireless networking.

The official WiMedia protocol will be known as ISO/IEC 26907 or “High Rate Ultra-Wideband PHY and MAC Standard,” which oversees a distributed medium access control sublayer as well as a physical layer for wireless networks. The standard blankets transceivers disseminating data at 480Mbits/s within the UWB spectrum of 3.1 to 10.6 GHz.

Additionally, ECMA-369 was approved as ISO/IEC 26908 or “MAC-PHY Interface for ECMA-368.” This specifies the MAC- PHY interface for a high rate, ultra-wideband wireless transceiver. The WiMedia Alliance also notes that the standard requires countries with international trade treaties to sell standardized WiMedia solutions inside their borders.

WiMedia Alliance president Stephen Wood raves, “ISO/IEC's approval of WiMedia-based ultra-wideband technology as an international standard, coupled with the recent UWB approval by the European Commission, enables consumers and business entities throughout Europe and other countries to benefit from the use of PC, CE and mobile devices powered with UWB technology […] We are very pleased with the overwhelming support these standards received across many regions, which indicates the importance of other governments to adopt technology that continues their efforts to increase higher proficient information societies and increase economic stability.”

The inclusion of WiMedia by Ecma marks a success for Intel and other WiMedia protocol members around the IEEE. Up to this point a deadlock existed between WiMedia and a competing Freescale offering. In WiMedia's favour, Freescale later created the UWB Forum and eventually developed the Cable Free standard. WiMedia was later sent to the Ecma for approval in 2005.

Read more about WiMedia's approval into the sacrosanct universe of ISO at the WiMedia Alliance website .