Philips Designs WiMedia Standard using OPNET Modeler
As one of the largest global electronics companies, Royal Philips Electronics develops cutting edge technologies in the healthcare, consumer, and mobile/wireless domain. As a supplier of wireless solutions, Philips focuses on the development and growth of the underlying transmission/networking technologies of mobile /wireless devices. Philips is one of the founders of the WiMedia Alliance and plays a key role in ensuring that the WiMedia protocol and convergence layers will provide high-speed wireless multimedia connectivity between devices in a personal area network. The WiMedia Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol is based on concepts invented by Philips. It operates with distributed control using mesh topology, and has simple ad hoc, peer-to-peer communication capabilities. Philips chose OPNET Modeler as the simulation platform for the core protocols of the WiMedia standard.
OPNET Modeler’s wireless modeling suite was used as a baseline for MAC layer protocol development. Once complete, the simulation platform was used to demonstrate proof of concepts. Philips has also extended Modeler’s WLAN model to incorporate Quality of Service (QoS) for 802.11e, and some features of the upcoming 802.11k and 802.11n.
“OPNET’s vast model library with source code, and its graphical user interface, greatly accelerated our development process. A modeling capability based on OPNET enables us to analyze the protocols that we invent. This has been essential for our success in standardizations bodies such as IEEE or WiMedia.”
Javier del Prado Pavón
Senior Member of Research Staff
Philips Research USA