Conflicting UWB standards

Conflicting UWB standards
The importance of establishing a number of organizations whose responsibility it is to
ensure the future direction of wireless technologies would be reliant upon their reading
from the same page, or so you would assume. However, it seems that the WiMedia
Alliance and the UWB Forum are singing from two different pages. The WiMedia
Alliance has adopted the Multiband Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing
(MB-OFDM) version of UWB. The UWB Forum, on the other hand, has adopted
the Direct Sequence (DS) version; you can already see this is just going to end in tears.
This is evident as the Bluetooth SIG has expressed an interest to work closely with
both groups; now we will surely hear rumors in the papers that the King is in bed with
UWB’s sister. Again, in light of Chapter 1, Making Sense of Wireless Technology, we do
have to apply a sense of proportion and reality when developing technologies that are
targeted to simplify many use cases. It is bewildering to read that there are two flavors
of UWB, which will ultimately go head-to-head in a battle to dominate. However,
Freescale and Motorola have both withdrawn their commitment from the UWB Forum (EETimes.com, October 2006). Freescale and Motorola, along with Pulse-
Link founded the forum in 2004 and, as such, it must leave the remaining members
(over one hundred or so) reeling. Naturally, the remaining members may be feeling
vulnerable and uncertain about their future and, as such, the WiMedia Alliance
should take an opportunity to grotesquely abuse its advantage.