Nokia and Wibree: Do we need yet another standard?

While the Wibree protocol is currently under development and should be
ready by mid 2007, the availability of the Wibree chip depends upon the
semiconductor manufacturers’ schedules. Wibree is similar in many
respects to the now prevalent Bluetooth standard. Both use the 2.45 GHz
band to transfer data and have a 1 Mbps transfer rate (although the
newer Bluetooth 2.0 standard already incorporates a 3.0 Mbps transfer
rate) and a rage of about 10 meters (m). The two complementary
technologies differ in size, price, and most of all power consumption.
Wibree would use only a fraction of the power consumed by today’s
Bluetooth chips, resulting in a much longer battery life and more
compact devices. While Bluetooth can be used to transmit audio and
media files, Wibree is designed to extend this network by serving
applications that transmit only small amounts of data and where size
and cost are priorities. Many applications that were not cost-effective
using existing Bluetooth technology, such as wirelessly controlled
toys, watches, medical and sports sensors, and a range of other
applications that have not been conceived yet, might be developed using
Wibree technology.

Source: The Future of Things

While I welcome the advancement of technology, standards committees and profit hungry companies always end up running a muck of things. Between Blueray versus HD-DVD, the delay of the 802.11n ratification, Korea inventing WiBro to compete with WiMax, it seems like companies take the “my way or the highway” approach to innovation. I hope Nokia (NYSE: NOK) makes the specification open to any and all developers, as well as making licensing costs ridiculously low to even free. Standards are great, but only when there is one standard if you catch my drift.