Low-power Ultra Wide Band technology for accurate indoor localization

Ranging and localization using wireless technologies are the main enablers for applications such as keyless access (cars, buildings), indoor tracking (e.g. equipment in hospitals, warehouses, factories) and augmented/virtual reality. A common scenario is a small, cheap tag whose position must be determined by the localization system.

Typical mainstream radios today, such as Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, can perform ranging, but are generally inefficient and unable to provide good accuracy.

Ultra Wide Band (UWB) technology provides accurate, efficient localization capabilities, and although it has been included in smartphones, it is still not widely present in today's infrastructure.

This technology consists of a UWB silicon intellectual property (IP) solution to be licensed and integrated into a chip for localization tags. This solution mainly stands out for the following attributes:

• It is optimized for low power consumption.
• It occupies a small silicon surface and therefore contributes to tag cost reduction.
• It provides ranging accuracy better than 15 cm in open space (as opposed to BLE ~1m).

To be able to optimize the above features, the solution sacrifices compatibility with smartphones. Localization systems that do not require connectivity to mobile devices can benefit from this technology.