Reuters (PRNewswire): LOS GATOS, Calif., Sept 10 /PRNewswire/ -- GainSpan((R)) Corporation, a leader in low power Wi-Fi semiconductor solutions, announced a strategic investment and technology development agreement with In-Q-Tel, the independent strategic investment firm that identifies innovative technology solutions to support the mission of the broader U.S. Intelligence Community. GainSpan provides the lowest power consuming Wi-Fi single chip solution for wireless sensor networks and other embedded applications, enabling devices to run for up to ten years on a single AA battery.

"GainSpan's innovative technology helps address critical technology needs of the U.S. Intelligence Community," said Troy M. Pearsall, Executive Vice President of Architecture and Engineering at In-Q-Tel. "The power requirements of Wi-Fi have traditionally limited its application in sensor networks, but GainSpan's low power Wi-Fi devices enable new classes of solutions that will provide key technology capabilities to both the government and commercial markets."

"Our strategic agreement with In-Q-Tel ensures that the U.S. Intelligence Community has easy access to GainSpan technology," said Vijay Parmar, President and CEO, GainSpan. "Also, as a member of In-Q-Tel's technology partner portfolio, In-Q-Tel provides us introduction to other portfolio companies where there are opportunities for knowledge-sharing and co-development."

GainSpan's low power technology applied to ubiquitous Wi-Fi allows its customers to leverage the very large installed base of Wi-Fi access points and devices, as well as existing tools and knowledge investments, to create many new products for security and access control, temperature and occupancy monitoring, and asset and people tracking.

Click here for complete story from Reuters (PRNewswire)

US PR Wire: [USPRwire, Thu Sep 10 2009] PINC Solutions, the leader in cost-effective real-time asset visibility technology, announced today that Transfreight has implemented PINC Solutions’ Yard Hound at its Toyota-dedicated crossdocking facility and the adjacent manufacturing plant located in Woodstock, Ontario. Yard Hound added automated real-time visibility for asset tracking to an existing yard management and shunt control solution.

PINC’s innovative real-time location system utilizes passive RFID and other wireless and sensor technologies to locate and track the positions of assets in the yard in real time, ensuring the visibility information for the yard is always up-to-date.

“We are pleased to enable Transfreight to monitor and track their yard assets in real-time utilizing our patented RTLS technology,” said Aleks Gollu, CEO of PINC Solutions. “As a well-recognized expert in the Toyota Production System (TPS), Erlanger, Kentucky-based Transfreight engineers lean supply chains for top manufacturers across North America. Our system helps further streamline the yard operation by providing real-time, accurate information about all activities associated with the assets while in the yard.”

With PINC’s Yard Hound, users have access to the yard information remotely anytime through secure web portals. Electronic records, automated alerts and notifications, and customized reports about our customer’s assets are also available. PINC’s customers realize many benefits from the system such as:

• Increased yard operation efficiency

• Improved yard truck and driver productivity and retention

• Reduced manual yard checks

• Increased yard velocity and throughput

• Improved equipment utilization

• Reduced late, demurrage and detention fees

• Enhanced customer and vendor services

Click here for complete story from US PR Wire

IT Business Net: GRAND RAPIDS, MI and SAN DIEGO, CA -- (Marketwire) -- 09/09/09 -- Skytron and Awarepoint today announced deployment of their Real-time Location System (RTLS) (http://www.awarepoint.com/solutions.html) at Frank R. Howard Memorial Hospital (Howard Hospital), in Willits, California. Howard Hospital is part of Adventist Health, a not-for-profit, faith-based health system operating in California, Hawaii, Oregon and Washington.

Howard Hospital is using Skytron Asset Manager (http://www.skytron.us/s-asst-mgr.htm), powered by Awarepoint, to track mobile patient care assets including beds, infusion pumps, suction and aspiration devices, electronic thermometers, telemetry and vital signs monitors. Assets are located campus-wide across multiple hospital buildings, including the main hospital, CAT scan building, outpatient imaging center and storage facility.

Skytron Asset Manager is powered by Awarepoint's ZigBee (http://www.zigbee.org/)-based wireless sensor network and is a fully managed service including hardware, software, remote monitoring and maintenance. Using underlying ZigBee technology and patented computational algorithms, the system provides true enterprise-wide awareness -- not only room-level, but persistent accuracy across the entire hospital footprint.

"The ability to tightly manage the location, status and utilization of our inventory will have a profound effect on reducing unneeded equipment purchases and eliminating lost or misplaced items," said Carlton Jacobson, Howard Memorial's Vice President of Finance. "At the same time, reducing staff time and frustration in finding what they need not only improves their job satisfaction, but increases the amount of time spent on direct patient care."

Click here for complete story from IT Business Net

giga om: Atheros, a Wi-Fi chipmaker, said today it’s agreed to buy Intellon, a maker of chips that turn the home’s electrical network into a conduit for broadband, for $244 million. While most of us use Wi-Fi for our home network, it needs a stronger — and more reliable — wired infrastructure to aggregate and move the ever-increasing amount of HD video streams, music and telephony around. Which is why Atheros CEO Craig Barratt, while discussing his company’s proposed acquisition of Intellon on a call with financial analysts, described powerline networking technology as the backbone of the home network.

Indeed, today’s announcement makes clear that Wi-Fi is not everything to everyone. Of course, Intellon’s strong gross margins and talk of sequential quarterly growth helped endear it to Atheros (and to the analysts on today’s call) as well. Intellon said in July that gross margins for its most recent quarter had exceeded 50 percent, and that revenues had increased 14 percent on a sequential basis. Intellon has done well selling its powerline chips into the European IPTV market, and has seen increasing interest in them for smart grid applications. It’s also been hawking Ethernet over coax solutions into China, and has been investing in the upcoming G.hn wired home networking standard.

Given all this, the combined company will be positioned strongly for the future, as more carriers in the U.S. and in other markets look for both wired and wireless network capabilities to integrate into their residential gateways and set-top boxes in order to move digital content throughout the home.

So what does this acquisition mean for other Wi-Fi providers? Most will need a wired solution to leverage in-home wiring, such as coax or powerline. While Broadcom has already made a big strategic acquisition of MoCA (coax-networking) provider Octalica, this move by Atheros might pressure the company to shore up its powerline technology, especially given that MoCA is largely a U.S.-centric play. Other HomePlug players include Gigle Semiconductor and Coppergate (which acquired the HomePlug assets of Conexant), while Spain’s DS2 offers a competing powerline technology in UPA.

Click here for complete story from giga om

FOX Business: LAKE FOREST, Calif., Sep 08, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE) ----GETAC Inc., a leading innovator and manufacturer of rugged computers that meet the demands of field-based applications, is adding to its extensive line of rugged mobile computing solutions with its introduction of the PS236 -- most portable handheld device with GPS, WWAN communication, and WiFi with Bluetooth capabilities, on the market. Offering a variety of features including a built-in 3 megapixel auto-focus camera, altimeter, E-compass, extended battery life, real-time voice and data communications*, and up to 12 Gigabytes of storage**, the Getac PS236 portable GPS PDA could very well be the only companion field professionals will need, even in the most extreme environments.

For field-based personnel, real-time communications in all forms is the most critical aspect of their job and the Getac PS236 provides it all in one handheld device. The built-in GPS gives exact location coordinates to within 5 meters and its built-in camera allows users to capture critical data and transmit with description tags specifying details of the photos. Using Getac's proprietary Geo-Tagging application, users can quickly tag a variety of geographic information including GPS, E-Compass, and Altimeter, into the JPEG file.

"The Getac PS236 offers users fast, reliable, and consistently accurate real-time communications solutions which are critical to anyone working in the field," said Jim Rimay, president, Getac. "Our customers work in some of the most extreme environments and need a communications tool that can handle severe climate changes and perform flawlessly. By extending the battery life and increasing the storage capacity in the PS236, our customers can spend more time in the field and increase overall productivity anywhere in the world," Mr. Rimay added.

In addition to its GPS system, the product's built-in altimeter and E-compass provide advanced accurate positioning features such as latitude and longitude, and altitude, as well as the ability to provide directional relations between the targeted subject and the user's position. The PS236 also features comprehensive wireless connectivity options, including HSDPA wireless WAN communication, integrated Bluetooth V2.0 and WLAN b/g WiFi. Users can connect the PS236 to a GIS server and instantly transmit or process data in the field using its built-in real-time voice function or a Getac Bluetooth modem.

The PS236 handheld PDA is perfectly suited for GIS surveying applications across different sectors including utilities, oil and gas, forest patrol, and surveying and mapping of geology and mineral resources. The built-in camera enables instant visual data capture on-site. The high resolution, 3.5" VGA touch screen display with sunlight readability and Transflective Panel technology dramatically enhances the viewing quality of graphic-intensive files and detailed maps in bright sunlight or snowy conditions.

*Combined 4GB built-in memory and up to 8GB SDHC memory card

The Getac PS236 features Windows Mobile 6.1 operating system. Measuring a mere 7.0 x 3.5 x 1.5-inches, the PS236 can operate at full capacity for up to 10-hours on a fully-charged battery. The unit is MIL-STD 810G compliant and IP67 rated for dust and water resistance. The Getac PS236 makes it easy to transfer data and does not require the need to learn the system.

Click here for complete story from FOX Business

Reuters (PRNewswire): SUNNYVALE, Calif., Sept. 8 /PRNewswire/ -- ZeroG Wireless, Inc., an innovator in low-power embedded Wi-Fi design, today announced that it has joined the U-SNAP (Utility Smart Network Access Port) Alliance and has early availability of U-SNAP modules, simplifying the process for smart-grid customers to "just add Wi-Fi" to their applications. U-SNAP's modular form factor, coupled with ZeroG Wireless' low-power embedded Wi-Fi, enables a whole new class of connected thermostats, appliances, power meters and many other home automation products to be brought to market with seamless Internet connectivity.

"ZeroG's Wi-Fi I/O products provide a secure, cost-effective, and mature IP solution for our smart grid customers," said David Friedman, senior director, strategic marketing, ZeroG Wireless. "Joining the U-SNAP Alliance and developing U-SNAP modules was a natural fit for us because it offers another simple means for our customers to just add Wi-Fi to their products."

"We are very pleased to have ZeroG as a U-SNAP member," noted Jon Rappaport, Chairman of the U-SNAP Alliance. "A compelling array of U-SNAP enabled products will be coming to market later this year and next, creating a broad ecosystem of Smart Grid ready, Energy Aware devices. ZeroG's Wi-Fi modules provide a perfect example of the future-proof flexibility of the U-SNAP standard, while simplifying Internet connectivity and device integration."ZeroG is currently engaged with alpha customers using its U-SNAP modules.

First products using these modules will be available in Q4'09, after which the Company will announce availability and marketing plans around the U-SNAP modules. For more information and to be considered for ZeroG's U-SNAP alpha program, please contact zgsales@zerogwireless.com.

Click here for complete story from Reuters (PRNewswire)

PR.com: Guangzhou, China, September 07, 2009 --(PR.com)-- DAILY RFID, a Chinese leading producer of RFID tags, has recently unveiled its latest UHF Gen2 RFID laundry tag-06 for industrial laundry environment. The laundry tag has been tested to survive after 200 times laundry process in industrial laundry.

Under industrial laundry process, most of RFID laundry tags available in the market can be reused only for 30-50 times. And DAILY's laundry tag can be reused for 100-200 times under harsh industrial laundry conditions since it is made of PET and copper to meet all endurance requirements in terms of heat and chemical resistance.

This ultrathin RFID laundry tag is designed in 0.7mm thick for easy attachment to linen, such as garment, towel and bed sheet. With strictly technique, it can work accurately when subjected to the harsh laundry conditions, including high temperatures, pressure and aggressive chemicals.

Click here for complete story from PR.com

Austin Business Journals: RF Code Inc. has received $6 million of a planned $12 million Series C round of financing.

Austin-based RF Code, which develops radio-frequency identification, or RFID, devices, received the capital from seven investors, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

RF Code was launched in Arizona in 1998.

In 2005, the company closed a $20 million Series A round of funding from Maryland-based QuestMark Partners and California-based Intel Capital coupled with Dallas-based angel investors Moshe Azoulay and Travis Hunt.

In late 2006, RF Code won an Innovator of the Year award at the Governor’s Celebration of Innovation in Arizona. The following year, it raised a $13 million Series B round of financing, enlisted a new senior management team, and moved to Austin.

At the time, CEO Mitch Medford said the company was poised to reach profitability by 2009.

Click here for complete story from Austin Business Journals

Reuters: SAN JOSE, Calif.--(Business Wire)-- Verayo, a security and authentication solutions provider, today announced it has partnered with Bartronics India Limited (Bartronics), one of India`s largest bar code and RFID technology companies, to provide cost-effective RFID offerings to the Indian market. The strategic partnership not only strengthens the long-term cooperation between the two companies, but also addresses the need for differentiated solutions targeting anti-counterfeiting and low-cost authentication. With the partnership, Verayo brings its unclonable RFID chip to India. Verayo`s RFID chip is based on a breakthrough "silicon" biometric technology called Physical Unclonable Functions (PUF). PUF technology is a type of electronic DNA or fingerprinting technology for silicon chips that renders the chips unclonable. Working together, Bartronics` RFID tags will incorporate Verayo`s unclonable RFID chip, and can be used in applications such as consumer product anti-counterfeiting, mass transit tickets, secure IDs and access cards.

Click here for complete story from Reuters

Earth Times: GRAND RAPIDS, MI and SAN DIEGO, CA -- 09/01/09 -- Skytron today announced the addition of Skytron Asset Manager, powered by Awarepoint, to its agreement with Premier Purchasing Partners L.P., the group purchasing unit of Premier Inc. Premier members will now have access to pre-negotiated pricing on margin improvement tools to create new revenue streams and reduce expenses. Skytron Asset Manager (http://www.skytron.us/s-asst-mgr.htm) is a perfect complement to Premier members, providing a way for hospitals to get more productivity while spending less.

"Skytron is extremely excited to partner with Premier in bringing RTLS solutions to their members' hospitals," said Mike Breslin, Skytron Corporate Accounts Director. "Skytron Asset Manager will have a direct impact on each member's bottom line and allow them to utilize their limited resources to provide the best healthcare possible. Premier took notice of an opportunity to help their member hospitals and has moved to capitalize on those real dollar savings quickly."

Skytron Asset Manager is specifically designed to boost productivity, lower equipment costs, improve workflows, and optimize utilization of critical assets. Skytron Asset Manager utilizes Awarepoint's patented ZigBee (www.zigbee.org) wireless sensor network technology that is easy to use and install, without disruption to patient care or existing IT infrastructure. Sensors simply plug into electrical outlets to form an enterprise-wide wireless network. Low-power active RFID tags are attached to equipment, which can then be located through the enterprise with one to three meter in-room location accuracy. A comprehensive reporting suite provides business intelligence about the location, status, movement and usage of mobile medical equipment. Skytron offers its RTLS as a fully managed service, providing hardware, software, installation, maintenance and ongoing support.

Click here for complete story from Earth Times