AntennaWare partnership with Skylark
September 20, 2023
Announced at IBC, specialist wireless audio ODM Shenzen Skylark Audio Industrial have signed a partnership agreement with innovative antenna company AntennaWare to develop a next generation UWB headset incorporating AntennaWare’s BodyWave UWB antenna.UWB offers outstanding features for audio applications including low latency and data payload, resulting in sub 10ms end to end latency with Hi Res audio. However, problems occur with UWB when placed close to the body with audio connection becoming unstable. AntennaWare’s BodyWave antenna directly address these problems, unlocking the full potential of UWB for wireless audio applications such as headsets, wireless mics and IEMs.Skylark’s reference design is the world’s first UWB headset that is commercially available to OEM’s considering next generation headset designs.
By 2027 worldwide shipments for headsets is projected to be almost one billion devices with a value of $35 billion and compound annual growth rate of 7.9 per cent. These devices will mostly suffer from poor latency performance and sub-optimal quality due to both the transport layer and audio compression algorithms used.However, implementing UWB as a radio and AntennaWare’s UWB BodyWave antenna will directly result in a significant audio experience improvement for the user.Skylark has been developing and innovating wireless audio products for 10 years. Skylark Founder Ms Summy explained: “We have witnessed the rise of TWS earphones based on Bluetooth technology and their acceptance by consumers. However, better audio experience has always been the pursuit of consumers and so we are always looking for better wireless audio transmission technology. The emergence of UWB audio technology meets the need for improved audio transmission technology and we continue to explore this technology and create better audio experiences for users. With that in mind, we are happy to formalize our relationship with AntennaWare and believe that working together to develop this next-gen headset design incorporating BodyWave UWB antenna will ensure we are the first to offer OEMs a UWB headset to significantly improve the users’ wireless audio experience. UWB technology offers high bandwidth, low latency and anti-interference, providing better audio quality and reduced latency compared to Bluetooth, and Skylark is committed to developing innovative UWB audio products and bring better audio experiences to users.”AntennaWare CEO and Co-founder, Dr Gareth Conway, added: “In Skylark we have found a partner whose aim it is to bring innovative audio products to the market. We are pleased they have chosen BodyWave antennas to solve the body blocking challenged experienced by UWB devices that have stunted its adoption up to now and that we can help them uncover the full potential of UWB for audio applications.”