VIA licenses Ericsson bluetooth tech

TAIPEI: Taiwan's largest chip designer, VIA Technologies, said on Tuesday it had signed an agreement to license Swedish telecoms equipment maker Ericsson’s Bluetooth networking technology. VIA said in a statement the deal would give the Taiwan firm access to Ericsson's intellectual property in radio and baseband cores for Bluetooth technology that links computers, mobile phones and other gadgets over short distances using radio waves.

The statement did not give the licensing fee for the agreement and VIA officials declined to comment on the cost. At 0502 GMT, VIA shares were down T$0.40, or 0.84 percent, at T$47.20, while the benchmark TAIEX share index was off 0.82 percent.

VIA is pushing the development of small, low-powered computers for home networks, arguing that such systems are more practical and cost-effective for average users than more expensive systems using high-powered chips from its archrival, Intel Corp.

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