Europe : picoChip announced that Global Wireless Technologies (GWT) has developed a hardware reference design and software for CDMA2000 and EvDO femtocells and picocells running on the picoArrayTM processor. This gives picoChip’s customers solutions for all the major standards, WCDMA (HSDPA upgradeable to HSUPA), CDMA2000 and EvDO Rev A, as well as TD-SCDMA and WiMAX, all on a single software-defined hardware platform.

GWT’s solution supports CDMA2000 and EvDO (including Rev A), for up to 32 users and peak EvDO data rates of up to 3.1Mbit/s. The availability of WCDMA, CDMA2000 and EvDO support allows customers to create cost-effective multi-standard products such as cellular femtocells and wireless access points, with the upgradeability and inherent flexibility of a software-configured solution. GWT’s reference design and software provides customers with a turnkey solution that significantly accelerates their time to market.

“This announcement means that we can now support a complete range of all of the 3G wireless technologies, including UMTS, TD-SCDMA and CDMA2000,” said Guillaume d'Eyssautier, President and CEO of picoChip. “That’s in addition to WiMAX and WiBro, where our reference designs are the de-facto standard. We’re delighted to be able to work with a proven, high-quality developer such as GWT. The availability of complete hardware reference design and software solution from our partners is a true mark of maturity and of the acceptance of the picoArray architecture.”

“Designing with the picoArray has provided us a smooth development path to a solution that integrates CDMA2000 and EvDO,” said Susan Elliott, Director, of GWT. “From our customers’ point of view, we’ve been able to enable them to support new standards quickly, and we’re confident that this combination of hardware and software delivers a simple, efficient route to create flexible products such as wireless access points, femtocells and other basestations.”

Peter Jarich of Current Analysis commented, “Femtocells are quickly emerging as a credible FMC solution; carriers around the world are seriously evaluating them. Yet, most early R&D and product announcements have focused on WCDMA, potentially putting the CDMA2000 community at a disadvantage. picoChip’s femtocell wins attest to its credibility and ability to flexibly support multiple technologies. The new product plans out of GWT, in turn, could be very significant, enabling CDMA2000 operators to compete with the threat from WiFi-based FMC and from other operators with femtocells.”

picoChip is a fabless chip company: it designs silicon circuits that are manufactured by its fab partners. The firm’s main offering is the leading multi-core DSP, which is optimized for next-generation mobile communications. It also has designs for HSDPA/HSUPA (sometimes called 3.5G) femtocells, and WiMAX, where its product is the de facto industry standard, used by Airspan, Intel and many other manufacturers.

GWT designs and develops multi-standard solutions on a generic platform that include complete hardware reference designs and software for the wireless communications markets. Through its latest effort, the Universal Access Point (UAP™), GWT offers customers a cellular access point solution that extends/improves network coverage (indoor/outdoor) for the following current and planned cellular standards including CDMA , 1XRTT and EVDO. GWT’s complete reference design and software solution enables manufacturers to react quickly to market opportunities, reducing development time, thereby bringing products to market rapidly.