CSR and Freescale collaborate to bring wireless connectivity to consumer portable media designs

CSR (LSE:CSR): Photo ref: PEM4771 To download: http://www.csr.com/images/hires/pem4771.jpg CSR (LSE:CSR) announced today the company is cooperating with Freescale Semiconductor on bringing wireless connectivity to a number of Freescale’s mobile and home consumer reference designs and development kits. CSR’s BlueCore4-ROM chip will provide Bluetooth connectivity for Freescale’s i.MXS development kit. The i.MXS development kit has been developed around the fast-growing i.MX multimedia applications processors portfolio and has been created to assist OEM and ODMs by helping to reduce development costs and speed time to market. i.MX applications processors have already been used in many diverse applications in the consumer space including MP3 players and portable navigation devices. In addition, Freescale plans to use two CSR technologies for the i.MX31 applications development system: BlueCore4 for Bluetooth and UniFi for WiFi connectivity. Both BlueCore for Bluetooth and UniFi for WiFi require very few components, making the combination ideal for mobile applications such as portable media players (PMPs). CSR's technologies for both Bluetooth and WiFi deliver industry-leading coexistence capabilities. CSR's proprietary interference avoidance techniques ensure two wireless technologies are 'aware' of each other, permitting Bluetooth and WiFi to be used simultaneously without compromising the quality of either. This means files can be downloaded from the Internet at the same time the user is listening to streaming stereo music over Bluetooth on headphones. Tracy Hopkins, Vice President of CSR’s Consumer Business Unit commented. "Our collaboration with Freescale is the latest of our longstanding partnerships. It is clear that the market for both Bluetooth and WiFi-enabled devices is growing rapidly with more and more classes of devices now available with wireless capability. As well as bringing highly integrated, low-power silicon to the table, peaceful coexistence between WiFi and Bluetooth is absolutely imperative.” Hopkins continued, "We see the mobile consumer market as particularly important area for CSR in the short to mid-term” Paul Marino, general manager of Freescale’s multimedia applications division, added, "Consumers are asking for the same wire-free capability they enjoy with other well-established applications such as connecting via WiFi for laptop PCs and bringing a mobile handset and headset together with Bluetooth. We see CSR’s wireless technology working in tandem with our own as a key driver to enabling OEMs to bring the best in mobile consumer solutions to their customers quickly.” – ends – About CSR CSR is the leading global provider of personal wireless technology and its product portfolio covers Bluetooth, GPS, FM receivers and WiFi (IEEE802.11). CSR offers developed hardware/software solutions, based around its silicon platforms that incorporate fully-integrated radio, baseband and microcontroller elements. CSR’s customers include industry leaders such as Apple, Dell, LG, Motorola, NEC, Nokia, Panasonic, RIM, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TomTom and Toshiba. CSR has its headquarters and offices in Cambridge, UK, and offices in Japan, Korea, Taiwan, China, India, France, Denmark, Sweden and both Dallas and Detroit in the USA. More information can be found at www.csr.com