Ethernet creator talks up potential of ZigBee
Bob Metcalfe, the inventor of Ethernet, predicted last week that the ZigBee wireless standard would be hugely successful -- which makes sense, as his company Polaris Ventures, has a stake in its success. The supporters of ZigBee, or the IEEE 802.15.4 standard, claim that it will allow manufacturers to connect billions of electronic devices to the Internet, but concerns have been voiced that the emerging standard is about to fragment.
Speaking at the NetEvents gathering of analysts, press and vendors in Barcelona, Metcalfe said that take-up of ZigBee would be rapid, as the technology shares many of the features that helped to make Ethernet so dominant over the last thirty years.
"As with Ethernet we have a standard, and then a consortium of companies wrapped around it," said Metcalfe. He estimates that around 10billion microprocessors are being shipped annually, giving ZigBee a massive market.
