Wearable technology has received a significant amount of attention this year, and the era of connected devices is only expected to gain popularity as people become more mobile.

With that in mind, Broadcom Corporation, a global company specializing in semiconductor solutions for wired and wireless communications, announced the Broadcom BCM20736, a new Bluetooth Smart system-on-a-chip (SoC) that falls in its Wireless Internet Connectivity for Embedded Devices (WICED) family.  The Smart chip aims to address the rapidly growing opportunities in different market segments for wearables and the Internet of Things.

“Broadcom’s WICED platform is gaining significant traction with key Internet of Things innovators like Electric Imp. In addition to embedded Wi-Fi, Bluetooth Smart technology is also growing at a rapid rate and quickly becoming the core of many small, battery-operated wearable devices,” said Brian Bedrosian, Broadcom’s Senior Director, Embedded Wireless, Wireless Connectivity Combos. “We are committed to pushing the boundaries on what wearables are capable of with our new WICED Smart chip. By offering support for wireless charging and reduced power consumption, we are empowering OEMs to design more effective products for more market segments, fueling the next generation of wearables and sensors.”

The Smart chip is a Bluetooth Smart compliant single mode low energy solution that is integrated with ARM CM3 microcontroller unit (MCU), radio frequency (RF) and Embedded Bluetooth Smart Stack all on a single chip.  It offers full software support, including GATT, profiles, stack, APIs and application software development kit (SDK).

The Smart chip is designed to consume less energy, power optimized for single mode coin cell operation and from 1.2V supply, has on-chip support for 2 serial peripheral interfaces (SPIs), supports Alliance for Wireless Power (A4WP) wireless charging and enhanced data security modes, PIN compatible with Broadcom’s existing Bluetooth Smart SOCs, supports secure over the air updates, and it is very small with dimensions of 6.5 x 6.5 mm.

The BCM20736 WICED Smart SoC will provide OEMs the flexibility to incorporate the chip in a wider variety of devices and even drive innovation for new use cases.  Because of its small form factor, it can be placed in wearable devices that are too tiny to have built-in sockets for charging.  And because of its low latency and low energy consumption built, we may be seeing wearable devices that can be easily charged wirelessly, as well as lasting weeks on end on a single charge.

“In the coming years, wearable computing devices will play a more crucial role in our lives. ABI Research projects over 50 million wearable devices will ship in 2013 and 540 million in 2018, providing higher user engagement levels,” said Joshua Flood, Senior Analyst for Market Intelligence firm ABI Research. “Bluetooth Smart will be a key enabler for ensuring the link between devices that are constantly ‘on’ and the optimum battery performance is held.”

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