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SPARK Microsystems Blog: UWB Wireless Audio Innovation Takes Center Stage at AES Europe 2024
AES events cast a spotlight on the many ways our audio technologies have evolved in recent years. Legacy wireless platforms, Bluetooth chief among them, have served us well in the past and will continue to excel in some applications going forward. High-quality audio isn’t one of them.
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SPARK Reference Platforms Help ODMs Like Primax Get Customers to Market Quickly with High-Performance UWB
ODMs are essential for speeding the design, development and production cycles for market brands of all sizes. Much of the value provided by ODMs comes from their ability to anticipate macro technology trends. This proactive approach accelerates customers’ time to market with the latest and greatest electronic devices.
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Designing with SPARK UWB for Enhanced Gaming, XR and Entertainment Experiences
In consumer device markets – particularly for apps like gaming, AR/VR (XR) and audio/multimedia – we hear a lot of talk about delivering improved “experiences.” Improved gaming experiences and music and entertainment experiences, for example. Is this just marketing hype? These products need to upgrade our enjoyment in order to justify the expense.
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SPARK and the Canadian Semiconductor Opportunity: A Global Endeavor with Local Roots
Gathering together key industry and government decision-makers from Canada and the US, Canada’s Semiconductor Summit helped establish priorities and define opportunities to enhance the competitiveness of Canada’s semiconductor sector in the context of tectonic shifts reshaping the global economy. The CSC acknowledges some important new realities.
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SPARK UWB Makes History in Industry’s First UWB Powered Consumer Audio Devices
We congratulate Sonus Faber for their technical achievement and vision. They have broken a major barrier in premium-quality, wireless audio delivery, and they’ve made history in the process. SPARK is proud to play a part in the Duetto design, enabling the high-performance, low latency wireless link between the two Duetto speakers.
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SPARK UWB Video Demonstrations: Visualize the Bandwidth, Latency, Positioning and Power Benefits
We’re delighted to share a library of video demonstrations showcasing SPARK UWB technology for a wide range of industrial and consumer applications. Beginning with an Introduction to SPARK UWB technology, this video series helps visualize the myriad advantages delivered with SPARK connectivity: High data rates, ultra-low latency and precise positioning/ranging.
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Are 2.4 GHz and Bluetooth Wireless Mice Interfering with Your Game Play?
It’s not exactly a well-kept secret that gamers have had to contend with persistent interference issues when it comes to wireless mice, headsets, etc. Among the longstanding gripes that SPARK UWB has arrived to solve: The frustrating congestion and signal interference that continues to haunt narrowband Bluetooth and proprietary 2.4 GHz implementations.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: Apple’s Vison Pro Headsets and The Future of Spatial Computing
All eyes were on Apple for the recent launch of its much-anticipated Vision Pro headset. As with previous Apple device introductions (iPod, iPhone, iPad – all were historic in their own right), the new Vision Pro is an engineering marvel in multiple dimensions. The impossibly sophisticated technology that’s been carefully integrated within the Apple Vision Pro is seriously impressive. Its capabilities – too numerous to detail here – are a testament to Apple’s innovation in, what it calls, spatial computing.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: Wireless Gaming Mice Have a New Performance Standard: Latency
While polling rate will remain an important differentiator among mice, when it comes to wireless gaming mice, expect to hear pro gamers and product reviewers alike talking more and more about latency going forward. The new breed of wireless esports mice should also be assessed for their latency, because ultra-fast polling rates may provide little advantage if the performance gains are squandered in latency.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: With UWB, Wireless Gaming Mice Are Finally Levelling the Playing Field with Wired Mice in Esports
Since the dawn of esports, wired mice were considered indispensable for serious gamers seeking the utmost in performance, but times have changed – technology has changed – and wireless mice are coming to market soon that will completely close the performance gap between wired and wireless once and for all.
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SPARK Microsystems' latest funding round to support commercialisation of devices and sensors
SPARK Microsystems, the Montreal-based fabless semiconductor company specialising in next-generation ultra-wideband (UWB) wireless communications, has closed a new round of funding.
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SPARK Microsystems Raises $34 Million to Meet Chip Demand Amid Supply Crunch
BetaKit discusses Montréal-based fabless semiconductor company Spark Microsystems $34 million CAD Series B financing as the broader chip industry continues to grapple with a supply crunch and demand fluctuations.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: With AR/VR Tech Heating Up, Experts Ask: How Will Users Control Their AR Smart Glasses and Wearables?
The news media has been buzzing about augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) technology on the heels of some impressive product unveilings. With AR/VR tech gaining early commercial momentum, technology leaders large and small are innovating and investing in AR/VR to speed the arrival of truly breakthrough XR and metaverse technologies. SPARK Microsystems discusses the state of AR and VR smart glasses and headsets in this blog.
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Holiday Shopping with a “UWB Engineer”: The Saga Continues
As the smoke clears on the 2022 holiday season, our frazzled and notoriously shopping-impaired protagonist takes a much-needed breather and surveys what months of carefully considered holiday shopping has wrought. The results? Quite frankly the results could have been better. Here’s what transpired.
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SPARK Microsystems and UBITO Leverages UWB Technology by developing Wireless, Battery-less IoT Sensors
SPARK Microsystems and UBITO have partnered to develop a range of UWB-based wireless sensing and IoT solutions. This partnership will allow UBITO to leverage SPARK Microsystems’ UWB technology for wireless, battery-less sensor applications in multiple industries, including smart home, industrial automation, and condition monitoring.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: For Wireless Gaming Mice, UWB Achieves New Performance Benchmarks on the Path to Seamlessly Interactive AR/VR
In order to architect the AR/VR connected devices of tomorrow, we must first solve the connectivity needs of wireless devices today. And for traditional gaming and audio apps, it’s clearer than ever that collectively we’re reaching the outer limits of what’s possible with legacy short-range connectivity platforms. The time for UWB is right now.
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Wireless Audio, Installation Audio, and Multiroom Improvements in audioXpress December 2022
In an audioXpress contributed article, SPARK Microsystems addresses the advantages of using Ultra-Wideband (UWB) technology to achieve high-quality wireless audio streaming and how UWB radios can be deployed effectively as a high speed and low latency data communication method, exceeding the performance of traditional narrowband devices and enabling uncompressed hi-res audio streams at 24-bit/96kHz with millisecond latency and very low power consumption.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: Good Citizenship Among Great Protocols - Planning for Future Interoperability Between UWB, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi
For applications like wireless gaming and audio, positioning/location awareness, and mobile AR/VR in the metaverse, it’s crucial that we work together to ensure UWB’s seamless coexistence among complementary short-range wireless technologies like Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.
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SPARK Microsystems Shows Way-Forward for Wireless Audio Over UWB
audioXpress covers the details of the joint SPARK Microsystems and UWB Alliance coexistence testing and aggregation capabilities of UWB technology in environments where other UWB or other wireless protocols and radio devices are in use.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: Getting Started Quickly with SPARK UWB for IoT Sensors: Introducing SPARK’s New Wireless Sensor Kit
At the upcoming Sensors Converge event, SPARK will be on hand to highlight the many advantages that UWB delivers for sensor applications compared to legacy short-range wireless platforms like Bluetooth. For Smart Factory and Smart Home apps, among others, wireless sensors are proving increasingly advantageous.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: UWB’s Sustainability Advantages: IoT Sensors with “No Wires, No Batteries”
Just as short-range wireless technology paved the way for deploying sensors without wires, UWB holds the promise for a future of sensors deployed without batteries. Power-sipping technology like UWB sets the stage for a future of battery-less IoT sensor devices that leverage energy harvesting technologies to derive their own power.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: UWB Puts the Mobility in the Metaverse
SPARK UWB is the short-range wireless connectivity platform best optimized for metaverse enabling devices like AR glasses, gloves and other peripherals, providing the robust, high-quality data comms necessary for enabling seamless metaverse immersion on the fly – with the power efficiency to ensure long usage times between device charges.
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With $7.1M in SDTC Funds, SPARK Microsystems Aims to Make Wireless Tech More Energy Efficient
Spark Microsystems has secured $7.1 million in funding from Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC) to accelerate the development and commercialization of its wireless UWB transceivers.
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SPARK Microsystems Blog: UWB in the Multisensory Metaverse, Part III: Touch and Haptics
Immersion in the metaverse would be fundamentally incomplete absent our ability to touch objects, environments and other avatars, gathering the tactile information we rely on to fuse our full perception and complete the sensory loop. This SPARK Microsystems post focuses on touch and haptics in the metaverse.
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Designing with UWB: Short-Range Wireless Apps Reimagined with Performance Far Beyond Bluetooth
With 10x faster data throughput, 60x less latency, and 40x better energy efficiency, UWB prompts a fresh look at design considerations from payload sizing to testing/certification and antenna design.