TI Supports Growth of Wearable Devices with Next-Gen Bluetooth Low Energy Application Software

Texas Instruments Inc. launched its latest Bluetooth low energy application software, the BLE-Stack 1.2, based on the Bluetooth v4.0 release. The BLE-Stack 1.2 is designed to further drive Bluetooth Smart and Smart Ready devices such as wearables – a market experiencing large growth as manufacturers take advantage of the increased numbers of Bluetooth v4.0-enabled smartphones and tablets.

To better serve the growing Bluetooth low energy wearables market, TI’s BLE-Stack 1.2 has an advanced master-slave switch feature, increased stack configurability and further power optimization, which enable the design of low-power, single-chip-based products with Bluetooth Smart capabilities.

The TI BLE-Stack’s new master-slave feature enables a CC254x SoC to support both master and slave modes at different times by allowing an application to easily switch between the two modes. For example, a Bluetooth Smart sports watch (peripheral) built with a CC254x can be connected to a Bluetooth Smart Ready smartphone (central device). The same sports watch can then switch to central device mode to obtain data from other peripheral devices, such as a heart rate monitor and a blood pressure sensor.

“TI’s CC2540 Bluetooth low energy SoC enables Recon’s MOD Live Heads-up Display (HUD) to elevate real-time user experience through connectivity. Users can connect the HUD, mounted inside alpine goggles, to an Android smartphone enabling the user to see caller ID, SMS and navigate their music playlists direct-to-eye without removing their phone from their pocket or worrying about battery-life,” said Hamid Abdollahi, CTO, Recon Instruments.

“By enabling devices that can switch between master and slave mode modes, TI is driving the growth of wearable and sensor-based devices to take advantage of the increasing number of smartphones and tablets with Bluetooth low energy,” said Sid Shaw, product marketing manager, Wireless Connectivity, TI. “For end users this translates into a smooth Bluetooth user experience – ease of use, long battery life and small-sized portable devices.”