K-micro to sample world's first IEEE 1901 fully compliant power line communication LSI chip set

Compliance enables high-performance, low-cost communications for devices that meet coexistence requirements of IEEE and ITU-T

San Jose, Calif. – July 25, 2011 –K-micro (Kawasaki Microelectronics America, Inc.), a leader in advanced ASICs, and a member of the HD-PLC Alliance, is announcing that it will be sampling the world’s first chip set that is fully compliant with the IEEE 1901 standard (dubbed the KHN13100 Chip), in August, 2011. This compliance will enable customers to realize high performance and coexistence with other devices that are compliant to the specification when they are available.

“PLC (Power Line Communications) has long been the preferred method of expanding a wired network without adding any new wires, but the consumer has had to navigate through a variety of PLC devices that interfered with other PLC devices, making it difficult to expand their network without a technical understanding of the underlying technology,” said Joel Silverman, VP technology solutions at K-micro. “The ISP (Inter-System Protocol) incorporated in the chip set makes it easy for the consumer to build and expand a Powerline network.”

K-micro’s “KHN13100 Chip Set” incorporates Wavelet OFDM technology, which is one of the core technologies of the IEEE1901 standard and provides superior performance as well as low power consumption. This PLC technology, licensed from Panasonic Co., Ltd. and Panasonic System Networks Co., Ltd, has been adopted for its ‘HD-PLC’ high-speed power line communication technology. This technology features the environmentally friendly capability to realize lower power consumption and lower costs through highly efficient data transmission.

The HD-PLC Alliance, which promotes the world-wide adoption of HD-PLC high-speed power line communication technology, recently announced a joint certification program for China named IGRS-PLC where the K-micro chip set embedded products will be certified. This certification will be conducted in a specially designated facility at the National Engineering Laboratory for Intelligent Grouping and Resource Sharing (IGRS) in Shenzhen, which is the first National Engineering Laboratory in China dedicated to certifying computer, communication, and consumer electronics technologies.

“We are pleased that K-micro is delivering the world’s first IEEE 1901 fully compliant chip set,” said Michimasa Aramaki, president and chairman of the HD-PLC Alliance. “We will continue to support the certification and promotion that accelerates the wide adoption of the IEEE 1901 based HD-PLC products.”

About K-micro’s LSI “KHN13100 Chip Set”

The coexistence specification, known as Inter-System Protocol (ISP), is a mandatory component in the IEEE 1901 standard, and K-micro’s LSI “KHN13100 Chip Set” includes this function. The same coexistence mechanism has been approved as ITU-T G.9972 and dubbed G.cx in June 2010, and was also recently approved by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) SGIP PAP15 as a mandatory requirement for all Broadband over Power Line (BPL) systems for home area networks.

“KHN13100 Chip Set” features include:

1. IEEE1901 full-compliance (with ISP support for coexistence)
2. PHY rate: 240Mbps (15% higher than the previous generation)
3. Wavelet OFDM methodology for low power (less than 1.2W in full operation)
4. Backward compatibility with existing HD-PLC LSI products
5. KL5BPLC100WFP baseband processor and KA5BAFE121WFP Analog Front End.

K-micro is planning to release an HD-PLC LSI targeted for smart grid applications in 2012. This chip will operate at significantly lower power and at data rates consistent with smart grid requirements. The lower speed devices are targeted at the smart grid system applications such as energy management, solar panels systems, etc. K-micro is developing solutions to enable power line communications to be used for a wide range of applications.

Availability

Samples of the“KHN13100 Chip Set” will be available in August 2011, and volume production will begin November 2011.

About Wavelet OFDM

Wavelet OFDM is a proprietary technique developed by Panasonic. Wavelet OFDM uses OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) to achieve efficient high-speed data transmission by applying wavelet conversions orthogonally to each subcarrier. Wavelet OFDM reduces the side-lobe level of each subcarrier with no redundant signals as a result of setting the orthogonality of the wave-frequency domain and time domain.

About HD-PLC ALLIANCE

The HD-PLC Alliance was established on September 25, 2007, to promote the world-wide adoption of HD-PLC high-speed power line communication technology, and the interoperability of devices that use that technology. The HD-PLC Alliance is a non-profit association of more than 20 members including industry-leading organizations. The Alliance dedicates its efforts to leading the international standardization such as IEEE, and certification logo program For more information, visit http://www.hd-plc.org/.

About K-micro (Kawasaki Microelectronics America, Inc.)

K-micro’s innovative ASIC technologies and world-class design support are used in the consumer electronics, computer, office-automation, networking and storage markets. The company is an active participant in industry standards organizations, including InterNational Committee for Information Technology Standards (INCITS) Technical Committee T10 for SCSI Storage Interfaces, PCI Special Interest Group (PCI-SIG), USB Implementers Forum, Universal Plug and Play Forum (UPnP), Serial ATA International Organization SATA-IO, Home Phoneline Networking Alliance (HomePNA), IEEE P1901, IEEE P2030, International Telecommunication Union (ITU), HomeGrid Forum, Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA), High Definition Power Line Communications (HD-PLC), and OCP International Partnership (OCP-IP). K-micro has design centers in San Jose, Taipei, and Tokyo. For more information, contact the company at 408-570-0555, or visit http://www.k-micro.us

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