‘LiFi’ provider Oledcomm shares experience of ITU standards process
Oledcomm started out as an R&D lab at Versailles University in 2005. That lab has grown into a company with global ambitions, developing high-security ‘LiFi’ solutions with infrared.
The company’s ‘LiFiMAX’ solution builds on ITU G.9991, the ITU standard for high-speed indoor wireless communications with visible light and infrared. LiFi provides network connectivity within a premises, similar to WiFi, but using light rather than radio signals.
“LiFiMAX is our best-selling product,” says Bastien Béchadergue, Head of Pre-Development at Oledcomm. “With semiconductors implementing standards, we are now in a position to develop a real market around this product.”
Oledcomm markets its LiFi products as cybersecurity solutions.
“It’s definitely a B2B market for the moment, and so far the main argument for LiFi adoption has been high security – an argument that interests companies in financial services, defense and legal processes, companies dealing with sensitive information.”
A route to market
ITU G.9991 details the system architecture, physical layer and data link layer specification for high-speed indoor LiFi transceivers, the LiFi access points within LED and infrared lamps.
ITU’s LiFi standard ITU G.9991 benefits from enabling hardware built for ITU’s G.hn family of home networking standards.
Available G.hn hardware provides an appealing route to market for LiFi solutions.
“To propose new products and enlarge the LiFi market, we need semiconductors implementing standards for cost-efficient entry to market and the possibility of interoperable systems,” says Béchadergue.
Oledcomm joined the ITU membership in December 2019 to propose the addition of new features to ITU G.9991.
“We are new to standardization processes,” says Béchadergue.
“We have found ITU to be an open discussion space. The LiFi standards work is technically strong, but with the flexibility to integrate new features fast. This flexibility is attractive to Oledcomm – proposing new features is the main aim of our participation.”
Creating an ecosystem
The growth of the LiFi market will be driven by many companies and two quite different industries, the connectivity industry and the lighting industry. LiFi could also support the very diverse Internet of Things marketplace.
“Standards are really the only way for these different worlds to speak to one another and collaborate successfully in stimulating the growth of the LiFi market,” says Marcos Martinez, MaxLinear, Associate Rapporteur for ITU’s working group for ‘technologies for in-premises networking and related access applications’ (Q18/15).
“We have seen a variety of proprietary solutions, but without standards it has been impossible to create an ecosystem.”
Q18/15 continues to add new features to ITU G.9991.
For all ITU standards under development in Q18/15, see the Q18/15 work programme.
Learn more about ITU-T Study Group 15
The international standards developed by ITU-T Study Group 15 define networks, technologies and infrastructures for transport, access and home.
For all working groups (‘Questions’), see list of Questions and Rapporteurs.
To learn more about ITU-T Study Group 15, contact tsbsg15@itu.int.
