Within this zone, a study will be done to determine the feasibility of UWB. At its conclusion in Feb 25, 2005, a decision whether to allow UWB for commercial use will be made, said the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA).
The IDA today announced that the UWB-friendly area is Singapore's Science Park 2, an high-tech incubator at the southern end of the island-state that is already home to several communications research firms.
Because UWB transmits signals across a broad range of frequencies, it can potentially interfere with existing civilian and military broadcasts, raising a need for stricter controls compared with other types of wireless technology, said the IDA.
The IDA's Dr Tan Geok Leng, director, network and enabler technologies, said that he was hoping that the S$1.5 million (US$800,000) scheme will attract at least five UWB research groups to Science Park 2.
He hoped that firms such as Wisair, Cellonics, IBM, Intel and Time Domain would be interested, he said. Local research group the Institute of Infocomm Research Singapore, which is also involved in UWB studies, is already housed in Science Park 2.
"All players will be given room to showcase the benefits of UWB," said Dr Tan.
To make the Singapore context more appealing, technical rules for testing are slightly different from those allowed by the U.S. regulators, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
The IDA will allow transmitters that are 6dB more powerful than those sanctioned by the FCC so that testers can try a higher data rate or wider range, he said. But the spectrum will be limited to between 2.2 and 10.6GHz, narrower than that allowed in the U.S., because of the fear of interference in Singapore's crowded urban environment.
In addition to cellular GSM networks for mobile phones, Singapore allows WLAN (Wi-Fi) broadcasts, and its Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) system is also wireless-based and operates at 2.4GHz. However, there are no ERP gantries near the UWB test zone.
UWB testers will have to abide by strict standards set by IDA, said Dr Tan. They cannot harm existing networks, but neither can they claim protection from other networks. The IDA also has the right to terminate interference-causing broadcasts.
Ultra-wideband is touted to be one way forward for high-speed wireless communications as it can carry large amounts of data, requires relatively low amounts of power to operate and its hardware can be made very small for mobile devices. Potential uses range from small area cable-replacement in the near term, to third-generation (3G) data networks for mobile handsets several years down the road.
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