Connectivity modules – Stop the Wiremess now!

Wireless technology creates freedom

Wireless technology is the driving force behind the most disruptive trends of our time. The elimination of cabling, wiring complexity and the associated infrastructure enables us to envision a future with enhanced quality of life, smart cities, autonomous transportation, unlimited communication freedom and billions of connected objects forming the Internet of Things (IoT).

In order to develop successful and innovative applications designers need to implement sophisticated connectivity solutions into their products. This implementation process requires careful consideration of a number of factors such as transmission distance and frequency, power consumption, and interoperability with other devices.

The increasing number of connected objects along with the diverse spectrum of wireless communication protocols and standards adds further complexity to wireless application design. A cornerstone in this challenging field of engineering is certification. In order to optimize time-to-market and prevent additional expenses and efforts for redesigns it is critical to dedicate high precision and expert-knowledge to antenna design.

Why go wireless?

In many application scenarios there are obvious reasons to choose wireless connectivity over wired solutions. At the device level the elimination of wired communication can help to seal products in order to make them water and dust proof. In addition, devices can be moved and distributed independent of cabling infrastructure and can be placed in remote and hard to access places.

On the system level wireless technology creates the opportunity to implement smart self-healing and dead node detection features as well as to execute over the air (OTA) updates. Furthermore, new nodes can easily be added to the network which significantly increases scalability and flexibility of the network.

Wireless networks enable a range of different topologies like star, mesh, tree, ring, and fully-connected. Each kind has its advantages and drawbacks; mesh networks for example are well suited for dynamic environments and areas in which central infrastructure would be hard to implement. Another important aspect within wireless network topologies is the differentiation between infrastructure and ad-hoc mode. In the infrastructure mode, all devices communicate through one single access point whereas in ad-hoc mode devices connect directly to each other, eliminating the need for a centralized access point. In legacy applications, wireless connectivity can be used to implement new features and to create innovative use cases as well as to introduce new service models.