GDA Technology Pioneers Smart Phone Reference Platform

Its Indian arm develops highly modular PDA Phone reference design Based on the latest Freescale i.MX31 processor

Embedded Systems Conference , San Jose, CA, April 4, 2006: GDA Technologies, Inc., the fast-growing Silicon Valley-based IP and Electronic Design Services Company, has introduced a modular phone reference board design for remarkably reducing development time for enhanced multimedia feature cellular phones and speeding up time to market.

The board, called Smart Phone Reference Platform, has been engineered totally by the company's Indian arm in Chennai. It uses a highly modular PDA phone reference design based on the latest Freescale i.MX31 multimedia application processor.

“This is the first time any company has engineered a wireless platform of this complexity completely out of India ,” noted Mr. Gopa Periyadan, Vice-President and GM, GDA Technologies.

The Platform's goal is to help manufacturers significantly reduce the development time for enhanced multimedia feature phones. Besides mobile handsets and smart phones, the Smart Phone Reference Platform can be used for MP3 players, PDAs, and Video Conferencing Devices. It will further serve as an enabler for anyone creating an i.MX31 platform. The board has also been positioned for future development and allows 3G support.

Mr. Gopa Periyadan explained, “This new platform will significantly reduce overall qualification and development time for new products, speeding up time to market. One way this modular reference design accomplishes this is by allowing OEMs to evaluate different subsystems such as GSM/EDGE, WiFi, Bluetooth, LCD, Keypad, and camera, among others.”

OEMs can now choose from several hardware and software bundles for the Smart Phone Reference Platform, beginning with a fully modular hardware platform. A full set of display/video and wireless subsystems drivers is also available, for easily converting designs into mid-to-high end PDA/Smartphones.

Currently, GDA Technologies offers a GUI completely based on the Open Palmtop Integrated Environment ( OPIE) with an Embedded Linux (standard) operating system. The company will soon introduce a Microsoft Windows Smartphone and Symbian OSs as well. GDA has licensable IP for the platform and will also offer customization. The Platform was demonstrated recently at the 3GSM Conference held in Barcelona , February 13-16.

GDA Technologies' System and Board design group has full turnkey hardware design capability. Focused on segments of Network Systems, Embedded / Computer Systems, and High End Consumer Digital Media Appliances, it provides projects up to 28 layers of printed circuit board density and complexity with a large number of close to 1500-pin BGA packages.

GDA employs more than 100 engineers working on embedded designs in Chennai, Bangalore , and Kochi . It has designed several switch platforms based on Broadcom, Switchcore, and Vertex-based switch ASICs. On an average, GDA handles 35 to 40 boards with varying complexities every calendar year.

About GDA Technologies, Inc.

GDA Technologies Inc. is a leading design services company with high value IP, value added design services and flexible engineering resources for the embedded, networking, and consumer electronics market segments. GDA focuses on designing systems, boards, SOCs, ASICs, FPGA's concept to product. It has successfully developed IPs and products in the areas of high speed handheld embedded solutions, digital video applications, Internet appliances, voice and data networking applications and non-form factor PC architectures. GDA is headquartered in San Jose , Calif. and has satellite design centers in Boston , Sacramento , Singapore , Chennai, Irvine and Bangalore , India . For more details, please visit www.gdatech.com