BVRP’s Market Leading Mobile PhoneTools Mobility Suite to be Combined with Broadcom’s Industry-Leading WIDCOMM® BTW Bluetooth® Software Stack
Broadcom Corporation, a leading provider of highly integrated semiconductor solutions enabling broadband communications, today announced a strategic partnership with BVRP Software to combine the BVRP Mobile PhoneTools mobility software suite with its WIDCOMM® BTW (Bluetooth for Windows®) Bluetooth® software. With BVRP being the world leader in PC-cellular convergence software and WIDCOMM BTW being the most popular Bluetooth software in the industry today, the marriage of these two leading products yields the most powerful and easy-to-use Bluetooth software solution for PCs and mobile phones.
As a result of this strategic partnership, Broadcom will have exclusive rights to integrate the Bluetooth version of BVRP’s Mobile PhoneTools software within its WIDCOMM BTW software. The new BTW software package will only be available to Broadcom’s Bluetooth partners since the version of Mobile PhoneTools has been specifically developed for tight integration with Broadcom® BTW 4.0 software (the latest available version). The combined Bluetooth software solution allows customers to connect to the Internet, send Short Message Service (SMS) transmissions, or transfer pictures, music, video, calendar items and contact lists to and from their PCs and mobile phones using single mouse clicks and no cabling. The new software package, available from Broadcom, will also streamline the process for configuring and managing wireless personal area networks, and is expected to significantly reduce customer support costs.
Belkin is always looking for ways to expand our wireless connectivity product offerings, enhance ease of use and reduce support costs for our customers, Said Eric Tong, Vice President “ Marketing and Product Development at Belkin. We are excited about the possibilities that this new software creates for us and congratulate Broadcom and BVRP for their efforts in making Bluetooth products more popular and compelling for our customers.
Acer is always committed to deliver the most advanced and intuitive communication solutions to our customers, and we are planning to introduce the new Broadcom/BVRP solution into our notebooks from early 2005, said Jerry Kao, Director of Product Management, Mobile Computing Business Unit, Acer Inc. Broadcom is our chosen Bluetooth partner; their partnership with BVRP will undoubtedly bring to our customers added convenience and exciting new offerings, as well as reduce our support cost.
Simplifying the Bluetooth user experience has become vitally important to Broadcom as we work with partners to ensure that hundreds of millions of Bluetooth devices are being used to their full potential, said Scott Bibaud, Senior Director of Marketing for Broadcom’s Bluetooth products. Our development with BVRP’s Mobile PhoneTools software unifies all of the leading synchronization activities in a simple interface that perfectly complements our WIDCOMM BTW Bluetooth software and addresses all of the challenges that end-users face. This is a natural and very exciting partnership of two industry leaders.
BVRP is very pleased to partner with Broadcom and package our Mobile PhoneTools software with the most widely deployed Bluetooth software in the industry, said David Wright, Executive Vice President and Director of BVRP’s OEM division. Combined with Broadcom’s Bluetooth software and silicon platform, our Mobile PhoneTools software takes any remaining mystery out of the process of connecting to and managing mobile devices from Windows-based computers. BVRP’s ongoing commitment to deliver the world’s leading solution for PC-cellular convergence will continue to result in superior customer value and the partnership with Broadcom will help grow our software to new levels.
Software Simplifies Bluetooth Synchronization
The BVRP Mobile PhoneTools software provides users with a graphical representation of a cellular phone that appears on their desktops or notebook computer screens. Once connected via a wireless Bluetooth link, the user can operate all of the primary phone functions in a much easier format, directly from his or her computer. With this new software offering from Broadcom, over 100,000,000 users of Bluetooth-equipped mobile phones can now: Access and surf the Internet via any GPRS/EDGE/CDMA cellular data links Transfer pictures, music and video to and from their camera phones and their PCs Send and receive SMS messages directly from their PCs Exchange phone numbers and contact information between their PCs and mobile phones Synchronize calendars between their PCs and mobile phones Send and receive emails and faxes directly from a PC Download and manage multimedia files, such as ring-tones, images and other files.
Broadcom’s WIDCOMM BTW 4.0 Bluetooth software incorporates the latest software “profiles” to ensure a common set of features between two Bluetooth devices. Bluetooth profiles are developed and standardized through the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG). The WIDCOMM BTW 4.0 software features many of the latest profiles, which provide advanced multimedia capabilities, including the Generic Audio Video Distribution Profile (GAVDP), Advanced Audio Distribution Profile (A2DP) and Audio Video Remote Control Profile (AVRCP). WIDCOMM BTW 4.0 also supports the Basic Imaging Profile, which provides the ability to “push” and “pull” images wirelessly between a mobile phone or digital camera and a PC.
Availability
The WIDCOMM BTW 4.0 software, which includes the BVRP Mobile PhoneTools software, is currently available to Broadcom strategic partners.
USB dongles and embedded modules with the new software package will be available in early 2005 from all of Broadcom Bluetooth partners, including Tecom, USI, Microlink/Foxlink, Billionton, WNC (Wistron NeWeb Corporation), Foxconn, CC&C, Air2U, Formosa and J3, among others.
About Broadcom
Broadcom Corporation is a leading provider of highly integrated semiconductor solutions that enable broadband communications and networking of voice, video and data services. We design, develop and supply complete system-on-a-chip (SoC) solutions incorporating digital, analog, radio frequency (RF), microprocessor and digital signal processing (DSP) technologies, as well as related hardware and software system-level applications. Our diverse product portfolio addresses every major broadband communications market and includes solutions for digital cable and satellite set-top boxes; high definition television (HDTV); cable and digital subscriber line (DSL) modems and residential gateways; high-speed transmission and switching for local, metropolitan, wide area and storage networking; home and wireless networking; cellular and terrestrial wireless communications; Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) gateway and telephony systems; broadband network and security processors; and SystemI/O™ server solutions. These technologies and products support our core mission: Connecting everything®.
Broadcom is headquartered in Irvine, Calif., and may be contacted at 1-949-450-8700 or at http://www.broadcom.com.
Broadcom Trade Press Contact
Henry Rael Public Relations Manager 949-926-5734 hrael@broadcom.com Bill Blanning Vice President, Public Relations 949-926-5555 blanning@broadcom.com Scott Bibaud Sr. Director of Marketing, Bluetooth Products 949-926-5868 sbibaud@broadcom.com T. Peter Andrew Sr. Director, Investor Relations 949-926-5663 andrewtp@broadcom.com