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Two UK wireless pioneers give roaming to Bluetooth

You can't roam on standard Bluetooth. That's deliberate. The original designers of Bluetooth decided to simplify the spec; by saying that once you made a connection, it was permanent - you couldn't walk into another room and switch to another link.

When Red-M first produced a Bluetooth "wireless access point" to be used by pocket computers to connect to the Internet, many said this was a distortion of the purpose of the technology. But the concept is proving viable - and with success, comes a demand for the ability to roam from one access point to another, without losing your connection.

Now Red-M has joined up in a project with Cambridge Silicon Radio, "to develop seamless hand-off technology that will enable mobile voice users to move freely inside a building whilst maintaining a continuous, uninterrupted wireless voice connection across multiple access points."

Normal Bluetooth links are simple cable replacements; a cordless headset, for example, linked to a mobile phone - or a PDA linked to a PC, or two hand-held devices swapping data. But an in-building mobile voice network with central servers, means that corporations can cut phone bills by using the Internet to carry voice traffic, instead of the far more expensive GSM network.

As announced here at the end of April, Red-M's Genos voice module and its voice and data access point (VDAP) are designed to enable Bluetooth headsets and cellphones with the Bluetooth CTP (cordless telephony profile) to use the in-building wireless network for making and receiving calls. But that announcement didn't mention the crucial problem; what happens when you move away from the place where you made the call?

The "hand-off" problem - one access point dropping the signal when the phone gets closer to another access point, which takes over - is what the Red-M agreement with CSR is about.

But not too many details are available yet. The deal was signed in May a year ago. "Our collaboration with Red-M will rapidly bring hand-off technology to market," commented Glenn Collinson, Marketing Director and co-founder, CSR adding: "We believe this is an important step forward for the industry."