Zigbee products discussed

Zigbee is all set to be the next big thing to enter the market. Today, there are quite a lot of companies which are already utilizing the Zigbee technology because of its high performance in order to answer issues related to performance like low power usage of batter and frequency range. Companies like Ember, CompX, Freescale, Chipcon and Arcom have invested in Zigbee chips already.

There are a few products which are already out in the market but they are still being developed.

Two of the biggest companies on the market using Zigbee are Arcom and Chipcon. Chipcon is using the technology in order to bring the system and chip costs down and increase the integration level with consumption of low power.

On the other hand, Arcom already has several years of experience in the field and is one of the most important companies in the Zigbee market.

Leading companies in the Zigbee market

Given below are some of the most important companies which are currently researching and developing Zigbee products:

* Helicomm
* MaxStream- known world wide for its Xbee products and its wireless modems, the company is definitely one of the most known in the Zigbee market.
* Luxoft Labs
* Crossbow Technology
* Innovative Wireless Technology

As of now, there are several development kits available for Zigbee which can be used for various purposes. There are a few individual modules which are not so expensive.

These kits are available in several sizes for different purposes. The sensors are used currently in agricultural and environmental applications but the main target of Zigbee technology is home automation which will definitely take some time to be fully achieved. The Zigbee technology is tested and used even in various applications that relate to heath monitoring.

However, Zigbee products are not the only ones in the field of sensor networks and home automation. It also faces severe competition from other technologies like the Z-wave, which is based on the open standard of Zensys. The standard focuses on similar areas like Zigbee but it might actually get to control a bigger part of the market. The only problem is that Z-wave does not have a global standard and it does not have the kind of publicity that is needed as compared to Zigbee.

Insteon is also another automation technology by Smarthome. It is again, quite similar to Z-wave and Zigbee but it offers dual band network unlike the single band networks that the other two utilize. Insteon development kits are also available in the market like Zigbee but large scale manufacturing is yet not in question.

Zigbee products are slowly making their way in the market, but sooner or later, they will have to face a very competitive market because of the constant evolution of technology in the market.