SK Telecom Selects Staccato Communications as Partner to Deliver the First Worldwide Deployment of Ultra Wideband WPAN Mobile Phone Services



    Staccato Communications and SK Telecom, the largest mobile phone
    and broadband operator in Korea, today unveiled plans for the global
    delivery of Ultra Wideband (UWB) wireless personal area network (WPAN)
    mobile phone services. The adoption of UWB by one of the largest and
    most innovative mobile carriers today will result in a host of new
    mobile handset applications. SK Telecom selected Staccato for the
    company's leadership in UWB silicon and for the competitive advantages
    inherent in the company's Ripcord(TM) single-chip, all CMOS-based
    family of solutions. As a result of this partnership, customers, for
    the first time, will be provided with increased choices for content
    delivery from access points, connecting mobile phones to larger
    displays (PC, TV, Auto), connecting mobile phones to the PC ecosystem,
    and sharing profiles and content from one user to another through
    personal area social networking (PASN).

    Services developed and launched by SK Telecom and Staccato will be
    standardized and offered worldwide to other operators after initial
    launch in Korea. With this introduction of UWB WPAN mobile phone
    services, customers will have expanded options and bandwidth for
    entertainment content delivery to their mobile devices. This means
    that users will now experience mobile social networking by
    communicating directly with other mobile users or from kiosks at
    480Mbps. As a result, individuals will be able to connect based on one
    another's proximity. This milestone marks the beginning of a
    revolution in the mobile handset market by employing WiMedia ultra
    wideband technology for 480Mbps WPAN connections.

    With the choice of the WiMedia Common Radio Platform as the
    foundation for the project, SK Telecom and Staccato are developing
    together applications using several protocols. This benefit is enabled
    by Staccato's PIK(TM) MAC (Medium Access Control) technology, which is
    a Protocol Independent Kernel, based on a custom implementation of
    hardware acceleration and ARM9 software control. This patent-pending
    technology enables the simultaneous operation of Certified Wireless
    USB, WiNet, Bluetooth 3.0 and other potential protocols at speeds up
    to 480Mbps. Products will initially launch with WiMedia radios using
    spectrum below 6GHz (band group 1, band 3) and add above-6GHz
    operation when the WiMedia Alliance completes the certification
    process for these bands.

    "The SK Telecom-Staccato announcement is significant for at least
    three reasons. First, it signals adoption of UWB in mobile handsets
    much sooner than anyone had anticipated. Second, it shatters the
    assumption that a mobile carrier is not willing to use UWB products
    operating below 6GHz. Lastly, but perhaps most importantly, the value
    of the UWB applications and services envisioned by SK Telecom looks
    like it could be very high and very beneficial to both the users and
    the carriers," said Fiona Thomson, market analyst, IMS Research.

    "SK Telecom is known as the most innovative and aggressive mobile
    operator in the world due to our history of not only bringing new
    mobile features to market before our competitors, but also defining
    such new features that other operators quickly adopt. Staccato is
    instrumental in furthering this vision by offering the solution that
    meets our requirements of price, high bandwidth and low power. In
    order to successfully deploy these mobile devices, we needed a
    solution based on single-chip CMOS. Staccato is the only company that
    has accomplished that product design with their Ripcord low-cost,
    small form-factor wireless solutions," said Dr. Jong Tae Ihm, vice
    president and head of the Mobile Device & Access Network R&D Center
    for SK Telecom.

    "From the beginning, Staccato knew that single-chip CMOS was the
    only viable option to achieve the cost, power and space profile
    required by handheld products like cell phones, and this endorsement
    from a major mobile carrier further validates our early path and
    Ripcord device family. As one of the architects behind the WiMedia PHY
    and MAC, WiNet and Certified Wireless USB specifications, SK Telecom
    recognizes that we have the relevant UWB leadership expertise to
    offer," said Marty Colombatto, chairman and CEO for Staccato
    Communications. "With the mobile handset market representing nearly
    one billion units worldwide annually, the decision of SK Telecom to
    adopt the WiMedia Common Radio Platform means a tremendous boost to
    the potential market for WiMedia applications and Staccato in
    particular. The impact of this will not remain limited to one
    application, but will bring an entire array of new features and
    applications to the mobile customer."

    For the first phase, a Korean-based, leading manufacturer of
    handsets worldwide will be the handset developer for the new WiMedia
    UWB handsets.

    For Additional Information

    For more detailed information on mobile usage models, creating new
    revenue opportunities and enhancing subscriber loyalty, see the
    Staccato companion whitepaper, "Leveraging Ultra Wideband (UWB)
    Technology to Enable Next-Generation Handset-Centric Applications," at
    http://staccatocommunications.com/papers/UWB_enables_new_handset_
    applications.pdf. For a photo of UWB-enabled mobile solutions, visit
    http://staccatocommunications.com/press/photos/UWB_enabled_mobile.jpg.
    (Due to its length, the URL above may need to be copied/pasted into
    your Internet browser's address field. Remove the extra space if one
    exists.)

    Staccato's UWB University will feature a live and on-demand free
    online webinar that will look at where UWB wireless comes into play,
    providing standards-based, high-bandwidth, multi-protocol
    capabilities, with the flexibility for auto-discovery and connection
    with a variety of peer-to-peer and/or local server-based networks. The
    event will take place on January 17, 2007, at 1:00 p.m. PST. To
    pre-register for the course, visit www.uwb-u.com. Archived viewing
    will be up within 24 hours of the live event.

    About Staccato Communications' Products

    Based on the WiMedia Alliance's UWB common radio platform and the
    Certified Wireless USB specification from the USB Implementers Forum
    (USB-IF), Ripcord is a single-chip, all-CMOS solution implemented in a
    complete, fully integrated System-In-Package (SiP) using leading 110nm
    digital CMOS process technology. Ripcord's high level of integration
    minimizes design risk, lowers system cost and accelerates customers'
    time-to-market by consolidating all hardware and software components
    necessary to implement a solution based on 480Mbps Certified Wireless
    USB. For more information, please visit
    www.staccatocommunications.com.

    About SK Telecom

    SK Telecom is Korea's leading mobile communications company, with
    more than 20 million subscribers. SK Telecom successfully
    commercialized the world's first CDMA cellular phone service and
    launched the world's first IMT-2000 third-generation service. The
    company is listed on the Korean Stock Exchange, the New York Stock
    Exchange and the London Stock Exchange. For more information about SK
    Telecom, please visit www.sktelecom.com or email at
    press@sktelecom.com.

    Staccato and Ripcord are trademarks of Staccato Communications.
    All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.