The fingerprint sensor market -- energized by the introduction of the iPhone 5s last year and by the Samsung Galaxy S 5 in the spring -- is expected to reach $14.35 billion in 2020, said a report from MarketsandMarkets (http://bit.ly/1qfw1Ro). Among the drivers fueling the fingerprint sensor market are increasing demand for simple, secure user access to mobile devices, mobile commerce and high adoption rates of smartphones, the company said Tuesday. Laptops own the highest share of fingerprint applications, but the segment will be surpassed by smartphones by 2020, with smartphone sensor sales expected to grow at a projected compounded annual rate of 56 percent from now until 2020, it said. Reductions in size of fingerprint sensors will enable integration in smartphones without sacrificing other functionality, it said.
The FCC Public Safety Bureau granted two waiver requests Tuesday for Anchorage’s application for authorities to operate an IP-based land mobile data system for public safety agencies and emergency responders on the general use channels on the portion of the 700 MHz band designated for public safety narrowband use. Anchorage intends to integrate the new system into the existing Anchorage Wide Area Radio Network (AWARN), the bureau said. One waiver will let Anchorage operate the mobile data system using 50-kHz channels, which is beyond the 25-kHz bandwidth the FCC typically allows under its rules. The other waiver will let Anchorage obtain from CalAmp Wireless Networks, the city’s equipment vendor for the project, equipment capable of operating with a channel bandwidth greater than 25 kHz, the FCC said. Anchorage’s waiver requests fit the FCC’s requirement that “unique or unusual factual circumstances” related to the system make it “inequitable, unduly burdensome or contrary to the public interest” to enforce the rule, the bureau said. There’s “little demand” for the 700 MHz general use channels in Alaska beyond the AWARN system, and Anchorage is justified in needing to use channel bandwidths greater than 25 kHz to achieve its desired data throughput rate of 128 kbps on the new system, the bureau said. All CalAmp transmitters for the new system must comply with industry-adopted adjacent channel power emission limits, which minimize interference to adjacent channels, the bureau said (http://bit.ly/VQVMMG).
The FCC Enforcement Bureau imposed an $819,000 penalty on T-Mobile for violating commission rules on making the requisite number of hearing-aid compatible handsets available to its subscribers in 2009 and 2010 (http://bit.ly/1qL3Oj0). The bureau noted it first proposed the forfeiture in May 2012. “T-Mobile does not challenge the Commission’s factual findings or legal conclusion that it willfully and repeatedly violated Sections 20.19(c)(2) and 20.19(d)(2) of the Rules,” the bureau said. T-Mobile asked for a substantial reduction in the proposed penalty, but the bureau declined to reduce the amount the carrier must pay the government, the bureau noted. “Given the fundamental importance of providing consumers with hearing loss access to advanced telecommunications services, the severity of T-Mobile’s violations, and the company’s ability to pay, the proposed forfeiture of $819,000 is equitable.” T-Mobile is reviewing the order, a spokesman said. “We provide a broad selection of handsets that are hearing aid compatible and we take seriously our commitment to meeting the accessibility needs of our customers,” he emailed. “This action relates to issues that first were raised by the Commission several years ago, and we are now in full compliance."
The FCC World Radiocommunication Conference Advisory Committee (WAC) is nearing the end of its multiyear process and continues to make steady progress, WAC Chairman Scott Blake Harris, chairman of Harris Wiltshire, said during a meeting of the group Wednesday. “With the conference confirmed for November 2015, we're actually in the final stage of the work of our committee and if someone wants to say, ‘Thank God,’ that would be OK, too.” Harris said there has been acrimony as the group works through a few final positions. The WAC represents commercial interests as the administration prepares unified U.S. positions before next year’s WRC. WAC documents are at http://fcc.us/1qLdda4.
Broadcom introduced a new development kit for its WICED family (for Wireless Internet Connectivity for Embedded Devices) family of components to enable developers to rapidly prototype “ideas and concepts” for Internet of Things devices and applications, the company said Wednesday. The $19.99 kit includes Broadcom’s newest Bluetooth Smart chip and five micro electro-mechanical systems and has a software stack that is Bluetooth 4.1 compatible, the company said. “By shortening the time between early ideas and end products, companies are able to deliver devices to market more quickly and with higher confidence in their success,” it said. Possible “use cases” range from a single-sensor technology to sophisticated programs gathering and analyzing data from multiple sensors, it said. It gave such smart home examples as using the kit to set up text alerts to be notified if a child’s bedroom rises above a certain temperature.
A week after Canada-based ChargeSpot announced the first wireless charger that’s compatible with both Qi and PMA wireless charging standards, the Wireless Power Consortium (WPC) asserted its independence with its Qi spec, providing a status report on Qi penetration in offices, restaurants, airports, hotels and public venues. A Qi spokeswoman told us there’s no correlation between WPC’s status report and the ChargeSpot release last week. WPC said Tuesday that the installed base of Qi-enabled wireless chargers reaches 30 countries and more than 1 million locations. “WPC’s 200-strong member companies are fueling exciting innovation of the Qi standard, Qi products and Qi-based business services, which is driving the accelerated adoption of wireless charging by consumers and businesses around the globe,” said John Perzow, WPC vice president-market development, citing 65 models of Qi-enabled phones and “over 500 different products that use Qi.” WPC said companies including Facebook, Google, Texas Instruments and Verizon have installed Qi chargers in corporate meeting rooms; nine McDonald’s restaurants in Germany recently installed Qi chargers, as have several coffee shops in Toronto and a restaurant in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Kube Systems announced a deal with Marriott Hotels for a Qi charging system, WPC said. Verizon has deployed 800 Qi-enabled charging spots in U.S. airports, while Haier installed charging stations in the Beijing airport and DoCoMo installed Qi charging systems in airports and train stations in Japan, it said. The installed base of Qi chargers charge one device at a time, the spokeswoman said. The company has yet to release its specification for resonant charging that will enable multi-device charging, she said.
EBay is offering iPhone sellers a $100 coupon if their phones don’t sell on its site Sept. 1 to Oct. 24, eBay said Tuesday. In advance of the expected iPhone 6 launch in the next few weeks, eBay released an infographic presenting historical data to predict the impact the new iPhone will have on existing iPhones and the electronics re-sell market. According to eBay, with each new iPhone model, the selling price of the iPhone models 4, 4s and 5, after the 5c and 5s launched, “averaged at around $280.” Prices have reached up to $420 on eBay for a used iPhone, it said. Four previously owned iPhones were sold every minute after the 5s/5c announcement, eBay said, and 16,700 iPhones were sold on eBay the weekend following availability of the 5s/5c last year. Some 400,000 iPhones were sold during the release cycles of iPhone 4s and later, eBay said.
Despite the wireless industry’s “best efforts” to keep up, “overwhelming demand has already led to isolated instances of congestion,” which will become more widespread unless carriers can access more spectrum, said a report by Rysavy Research released by 4G Americas Tuesday. LTE deployments “have been faster than any wireless technology previously deployed” and 5G is on the way, the report said (http://bit.ly/1lunED0). It said computing is rapidly changing from the PC era to a world where many users rely on mobile devices. Cloud computing “is a significant and growing contributor to data demand,” Rysavy said. “Growth drivers include cloud-based data synchronization, backup, applications, and streaming media.” Carriers, meanwhile, are addressing exploding demand through “a combination of spectrally more efficient technology, denser deployments, small cells, Heterogeneous Networks (HetNets), self-configuration, self-optimization, use of unlicensed spectrum with Wi-Fi, and the future possibility of LTE operation in unlicensed bands,” the report said.
A new survey showed that most Americans want technology that will allow them to be located with more accuracy when they make a 911 call from inside their homes, the Find Me 911 Coalition said Tuesday (http://bit.ly/1qpe6bW). The group released an online survey of more than 1,000 respondents that said two-thirds of wireless subscribers thought emergency responders could locate them at least to their block, if they call 911 from inside their homes. “Only 6 percent of cell phone owners correctly responded that the information would likely only be accurate to the neighborhood level or worse,” the coalition said. Sixty-three percent said they would consider switching providers if it meant they could be more accurately located when they make an indoor call to 911, the survey found. “When people dial 9-1-1 on their cell phones, they think the operator can find their location to send help,” said Jamie Barnett, director of the coalition and former FCC Public Safety Bureau chief. “Unfortunately, the carriers have chosen cheaper, less effective location technologies, and people are dying because emergency responders can’t find them.” The coalition is supported by TruePosition, a company that offers alternative technology for locating wireless 911 callers (http://bit.ly/1pHjVRV). Carriers fired back at the coalition. “The latest from Jamie Barnett and his client, location vendor TruePosition, only reveals their objective to derail efforts by CTIA and its member companies to find a viable solution,” said Scott Bergmann, CTIA vice president-regulatory affairs. “It doesn’t help public safety or consumers to continue to press for mandates that existing technology can’t deliver.” Carriers understand the importance of delivering “precise, accurate information” to PSAPs, but TruePosition’s technology is “just one solution among many, and carriers should be allowed to choose the service that best fits their technology needs,” said Steve Berry, president of the Competitive Carriers Association. “We are not aware of any viable solution for precise wireless indoor location information available today,” he added. AT&T made a filing at the FCC Tuesday, questioning claims the coalition has made of poor wireless carrier performance on 911 calls in Washington, D.C. Verizon and T-Mobile have made similar filings at the agency (CD Aug 20 p9). “Unfortunately, rather than contributing to the serious conversation about wireless E911 and indoor location accuracy, apparently the FindMe911 Coalition has decided to continue (in bad faith) to draw erroneous conclusions from data collected by the FCC from various [public safety answering points] throughout the country,” AT&T said in a filing in docket 07-114.
Worldwide revenue from tablet games is forecast to reach $13.3 billion by 2019, up from $3.6 billion this year, said a Juniper Research report. Growth will be fueled by improved storage capacity of devices, better graphics, increasing mobile broadband penetration and consumers’ preference for convenience and ubiquity, Juniper said in a Tuesday news release (http://bit.ly/1p74HRt). The next year “could be critical” for smaller, independent games developers, it said, because in a market with more than a million apps, more investment will be needed to gain consumer awareness.