Future Electronics has signed a worldwide franchise distribution agreement with Decawave, a manufacturer of low-cost, low-power indoor positioning ICs and modules.
Under the agreement, which is effective immediately, Future Electronics is stocking production volumes of Decawave’s DW1000 wireless transceiver, an IEEE802.15.4-2011 Ultra-Wideband (UWB)-compliant device, and the DWM1000 module, which is based on the transceiver. Design engineers can also order the EVK1000 and TREK1000 Evaluation Kits.
Mickael Viot, Vice-President of Marketing at Decawave, said: ‘Decawave’s technology is proven in the marketplace. It is far more accurate than other technologies, and can be implemented in system designs at low cost and with low power consumption. Now this new partnership with Future Electronics will give Decawave access to a very wide customer base in the industrial, medical, automotive, consumer and other markets, and we expect to see a very big ramp-up in the rate of adoption of our breakthrough technology.’
Today, position data in applications with no or limited access to satellite positioning system signals can be calculated by triangulating Wi-Fi or Bluetooth signals, but the precision of such measurements is limited to more than 1m, and the software required to implement the system is extremely complex.
Future is anticipating a high level of interest in Decawave’s DW1000 and DWM1000 products because they provide a ready-made solution for indoor positioning that is much more precise and accurate than the Wi-Fi or Bluetooth-based alternatives: the Decawave system’s raw positioning output is accurate to ±10cm in three dimensions.
Fabricated in a standard CMOS process, the DW1000 and DWM1000 are attractively priced. In addition, the devices’ low power consumption, comparable to that of a Bluetooth Low Energy transceiver, means that the Decawave solution is suitable for use in wearable and Internet of Things (IoT) devices and in portable and battery-powered products.
Decawave technology is already in use in industrial, automotive and consumer applications.
Other likely applications include asset tracking in factories and hospitals, autonomous vehicle guidance in factories and warehouses, safety curtains around hazardous equipment, drones and guidance and position tracking for shoppers in retail stores.
Future Electronics is ready to support customers in integrating Decawave’s technology into end product designs, providing specialist applications engineering support, product demonstrations and sales of evaluation kits.
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