Digi International has said that its Spectrum (News - Alert) Design Solutions, a wireless consulting group and a provider of embedded cellular integrator, is developing machine-to-machine, or “M2M,” designs using Qualcomm’s (News - Alert) Gobi modules.

 

Also, Spectrum Design Solutions is working with Qualcomm to promote such M2M designs and Qualcomm’s Gobi technology. Spectrum expects to help customers reduce time-to-market of Gobi-enabled wireless M2M products by up to 50 percent.

 

Gobi technology provides multi-mode 3G connectivity for high speed packet access, or “HSPA,” and evolution-data optimized, or “EV-DO,” networks in a single module. Qualcomm officials said that this enables a device such as an embedded gateway to support multiple cellular networks for data connectivity throughout the world. Also, it enables customers to support a different standard in the future than initially selected.

 

Gobi modules provide 3G connectivity for numerous applications including energy, industrial, agriculture, retail, financial, and building automation.

 

“Gobi modules enable a device to access virtually any leading 3G cellular network,” Mike Fette, vice president of business development at Spectrum Design Solutions, said, adding that there is a strong demand from M2M device manufacturers for multi-network support, and this relationship makes Gobi technology more accessible for the M2M space.

 

Beau Beck, senior director, wireless connectivity at Qualcomm called Gobi the first embedded mobile wireless solution to allow multi-network support. This provides global connectivity for the enterprise and greater flexibility for device deployment.

 

Additionally, Beck said that he believes that Spectrum’s extensive cellular certification expertise will help organizations rapidly deploy this technology for M2M applications.

 

“We find that M2M device manufacturers aren’t necessarily wireless experts,” Bruce York, business development manager at 7 layers, an accredited laboratory for cellular certification, said. “They often need a lot of support from us during the complex certification process.”

 

York said that it can be extremely valuable to have a center of excellence such as Spectrum leveraging Qualcomm technology to assist manufacturers before they come to the stage of final product certification.