BSQUARE Unveils New Program to Hasten Industry-Wide Implementation of SD — Secure Digital — Technology

Business Wire, March 12, 2002

Business/High-Tech Editors

Embedded Systems Conference 2002

BELLEVUE, Wash.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 12, 2002

SDIO Now! Program Supplies Peripheral and Portable

Device Manufacturers with Industry Standardized Device

Driver Package for Rapid Product Development

BSQUARE Corporation (Nasdaq:BSQR) today announced a new technology program to help portable device, card host controller, and peripheral manufacturers support SD (Secure Digital) and SD IO products for their Microsoft Windows CE-based smart devices.

BSQUARE's SDIO Now! program provides members with software subsystems, peripheral driver development tools and the technical assistance needed to support SD on the Windows CE .NET operating system, and the Pocket PC and Smartphone device platforms. Program members leverage BSQUARE's core competency in driver development, making product development process faster and less expensive.

SD is a standard for data storage and peripheral I/O expansion for small form-factor devices. Postage stamp-sized cards can store data on portable devices, such as MP3 players, digital cameras, handheld computers, and mobile phones. SD also allows portable devices to add peripherals for I/O expansion including digital cameras, GPS and wireless communications such as Bluetooth and 802.11x. "Native" support for SD IO is not currently provided in Windows Embedded operating systems. Peripheral manufacturers are required to write custom peripheral device drivers, which support proprietary bus driver interfaces. Device OEMs are limited to the peripherals that support proprietary bus drivers. SDIO Now! enables the production of SD IO-capable products while reducing cost and eliminating incompatibilities by providing standardized interfaces.

"As an industry leader in developing low-level system software, custom kernel-mode device drivers, and device driver API tools, BSQUARE is a logical and neutral entity to create and license the software necessary to implement SD on the Windows Embedded platform," said Brian Deutsch, general manager and vice president of vertical solutions at BSQUARE. "By partnering with as many portable device, card-host controller, and peripheral manufacturers as possible, BSQUARE's SDIO Now! program offers the most functionally-robust technology to support the greatest number of vendors at the lowest possible cost."

"OEMs need to ensure that their Windows Powered smart devices are able to take advantage of the latest innovative peripherals," said Keith White, senior director of marketing for the Embedded and Appliance Platforms Group at Microsoft Corp. "Leveraging the extensibility of Windows CE, BSQUARE's SDIO Now! program will help meet this demand by providing OEMs with the foundation to easily include SD support in their mobile and small-footprint Windows CE-based devices."

BSQUARE has worked closely with Socket Communications (NASDAQ:SCKT), a leading provider of Windows CE-based expansion products, in defining the SDIO Now! program. "A new peripheral expansion technology has to be easy for end users to understand and utilize for it to gain wide acceptance in the marketplace," said Socket executive vice president, Mike Gifford. "Today's complex and fast-moving development cycles require a team effort to make this happen. The SDIO Now! program is a great vehicle to build that team and bring quality, easy-to-use SD-capable products to market faster."

BSQUARE has already received strong initial industry interest in the SDIO Now! program. Current SDIO Now! members include Microsoft, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. Semiconductor Company, Tokyo Electron Device Limited, Socket Communications and AMD (Advanced Micro Devices).

"For far less money than it would take to create a proprietary system and peripheral driver solution, membership in SDIO Now! gave us a royalty-free license to use and distribute the technology necessary to successfully deploy I/O capable SD technology on Windows CE platforms," said Shige Ohtani, Engineering Manager, TOP Marketing Group at Tokyo Electron Device Ltd. "This allowed us to bring our SD Memory/SD IO Host Controllers to market quickly and with full support of the other SDIO Now! program members."

BSQUARE SDIO Now! Program

SDIO Now! provides a coordinated approach to delivering system software among portable device OEMs, chipset vendors, and card-host controller and peripheral manufacturers. With a standard driver architecture and APIs, peripheral vendor scan feel confident that their products will be compatible with various devices regardless of the choice of SD host controller or platform architecture.

With standard architectures for adding SD card bus functionality, device OEMs can choose from a variety of host controller solutions and rapidly add SD card support without having to develop the complex infrastructure for supporting commercially available peripherals. Furthermore, a semiconductor vendor can provide the necessary software module to enable the SD card host functionality with little or no development from the OEM.