Insight

WiGig / Tri-band WiFi growth to 2018 – and by market sector

Written by Blu Wireless | Dec 4, 2013 8:19:24 AM

An interesting article has appeared in the latest edition of Nikkei (paywall link) that highlighted the growth of WiGig and other 60GHz wireless streaming technologies.

The 8-page cover story is worth checking out, even with an awful Google Translation, if for no other reason than their infographic that shows the predicted emergence of WiGig in systems coming out of Japanese countries from 2014 and beyond.

Much has been written in both the trade and the consumer tech press (and even some national papers in the US and UK) and analyst houses like ABI have predicted that 2014 will be the year that WiGig makes its mark on the WiFi chipset market – see graph below – but the vast majority of this has been centred on the western markets.

Nikkei’s WiFi market growth predictions – likely based on ABI data – reproduced from Nikkei’s WiGig report December 2013.

But, this is not only displays evidence of market adoption, it does so in a market that often does its own thing. Interestingly, the piece references the 5GHz WiFi standard 802.11ac along with 60GHz standards 802.11ad (WiGig) and WirelessHD, but the only reference to the Japanese wireless standard TransferJet is the 4.6GHz NFC alternative and not v3.0.

Also poignant is Nikkei’s analysis of where the growth will come from, with PCs adopting the standard from 2014, phones from 2015 and home servers / TVs from 2016.

Where WiGig growth will come from – reproduced from Nikkei’s WiGig report December 2013

It should be noted that Panasonic developed a TV set with WiGig and demonstrated this at the Intel Developers forum. And, with CES coming in January we’ll get to see exactly what has been developed for potential launch in 2014.

We will be out there and watching with a keen eye. If you’re attending or exhibiting and would like to meet up to discuss integrating our HYDRA 60GHz baseband IP into your chipset then do get in touch.