In an exclusive announcement made at IBC, AntennaWare has announced a partnership agreement with specialist wireless audio ODM Shenzen Skylark Audio Industrial Co (Skylark) to develop an innovative Ultra-Wide Band headset incorporating AntennaWare’s BodyWave UWB antenna. 

UWB (for BodyWave 6.5GHz/Channel 5 and 8GHz/Channel 9) is well suited to broadcast audio as it offers the 5Mbit/s required for Linear PCM Hi-Res audio, but dropouts caused by body blocking make it unreliable for audio applications when the device is worn close to the body.  

Partnership broadens potential for UWB audio

(l-r) Jason Guo, CTO, Skylark, and Matthew Magill, Co-Founder and CTO AntennaWare, sign the partnership MOU on the show floor at IBC2023 

AntennaWare’s BodyWave antenna addresses these challenges and aims to unlock the full potential of UWB for wireless audio applications such as headsets, wireless mics and IEMs. 

Jonny McClintock, Commercial Director, Antennaware, said: “UWB offers such good opportunities, but it is susceptible to body blocking on higher frequencies because the human body acts as an attenuator. Bodywave enables the RF to ripple around the body to give us up to 20Db better gain, which solves that problem.” 

Skylark’s reference design is claimed to be the world’s first UWB headset that is commercially available to OEMs considering next-generation headset designs. The company has been developing wireless audio products for 10 years. 

Stand Number: 8.B77a

Company: AntennaWare

 

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