Published in IoT

ARM buys two IoT outfits

by on20 April 2015


Because you can never have too many

British chip designer ARM has been writing cheques to buy two outfits to give it an edge on the Internet of Things market.

Wicentric, a Bluetooth Smart stack and profile provider, and Sunrise Micro Devices (SMD), which makes sub-one volt Bluetooth radio intellectual property (IP) all feel before Arm's mighty buying power.

No one is saying anything about the terms of the agreements, which is an encouraging sign.

Arm has said that the IP of both companies will be integrated to form the ARM Cordio portfolio. This portfolio is the bit aimed to complement ARM's existing processor and physical IP which is for the low-power wireless communications such as the Internet of Things (IoT).

Wicentric was a privately held provider of Bluetooth Smart software focused on enabling the development of low-power wireless products. Its product line included Bluetooth protocol stack and profiles for creating interoperable smart products and the link layer for silicon integration.

Sunrise is a privately held provider of radio IP gear including a pre-qualified, self-contained radio block and related firmware to simplify radio deployment. Central to all SMD radios is native sub-one volt operation. Operating below one volt enables the radio to run much longer on batteries or harvested energy.

Sunrise was founded and run by several former members of Motorola Labs, a research unit affected by Motorola's large round of layoffs in 2008. It makes most of its cash licensing ARM designs for smartphone chips and has been trying to push into the IoT presence.

Last modified on 21 April 2015
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