James Delahunty
19 Jun 2010 1:04
Broadcom has agreed to buy Innovation Research & Technology which specializes in short range communication for a fee of around $47.5 million, the company announced on Thursday. While Innovation makes products for a variety of different wireless products, Broadcom has highlighted Innovation's progress in Near-Field Communications (NFC).
Innovation launched the Topaz-512 this week, which opens the door for content delivery including for example discount coupons that can be be retrieved via smart posters.
Broadcom is staying silent about how it intends to use Innovation's technology. However it is likely that Broadcom intends to integrate NFC with its existing solutions for other wireless technologies, including Bluetooth and 3G.
The lack of NFC-enabled phones has been seen as one of the major factors holding the wireless technology back, but Nokia recently announced that all smartphones it releases from 2011 will include NFC capabilities.