Cambridge, U.K.-based fabless startup Artimi Ltd. has secured another round of funding toward research and development of its flexible ultra-wideband (UWB) transceivers with multiple interfaces. In a recent announcement the UWB IC developer stated it has raised $14 million in Series A, which adds to the more than $1 million it raised last October.

Artimi participates in standard-setting IEEE 802.15.3.a working groups. It is a member of the the multiband orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) alliance, or MBOA. Through active participation in the standards process, Artimi expects to provide products that will interoperate with other standards-compliant UWB devices.

As IEEE continues to seek a common solution to two different proposals, Artimi is taking a flexible approach. Hence, it intends to develop a design that can quickly align with any specification that ultimately will be a winner. Meanwhile, the two major UWB camps in this fight are MBOA, backed by Intel, Staccato Communications, Texas Instruments, Philips and others and direct-sequence code division multiplex (DS-CDMA) proposal supported by XtremeSpectrum and Freescale Semiconductor Inc.

In a low-cost, single-chip solution, Artimi’s patented technology will extend the range and boost the performance of UWB connectivity, making it the UWB silicon of choice for many manufacturers, claims the developer.

“Artimi has assembled an unparalleled engineering and management team with a proven track record of bringing leading semiconductor products to market,” said Giuseppe Zocco, general partner at Index Ventures, who joins the board. “Artimi has already demonstrated a complete end-to-end UWB system for streaming video, which is attracting strong customer interest. The company is adding other proprietary features to its products that will greatly expand the applications of their technology.”

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