BIZ IT - Bluetooth Wins Award

Bluetooth SIG Crowns Creative Inspire S2 Wireless Speakers Winner of 5th Annual Best of CES Awards User’s Choice Winner, Microsoft Bluetooth? Mobile Keyboard 6000, Also Unveiled During Annual Celebration of Bluetooth Wireless Technology

LAS VEGAS, Nevada USA -- (BUSINESS WIRE)

Wednesday January 13, 2010

From the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2010 in Las Vegas, the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, Inc. (SIG) announced Creative and apt-X Creative Inspire S2 Wireless Speakers as the winner of its 5th Annual Best of CES 2010 Awards, an event held during CES to highlight the innovative and user friendly Bluetooth enabled products that will be making their mark on the consumer electronics industry in the coming year. “The Creative Inspire S2 Wireless Speakers, the winner of the 5th annual awards program, exemplifies all these characteristics and more, capturing the best in the evolution of Bluetooth technology.”

“As the industry prepares for a groundbreaking year in wireless technology, certain products stand above all others as outstanding Bluetooth enabled devices, bringing together functionality, innovative design, and a positive user-friendly experience,” said Michael Foley, Ph.D., executive director of the Bluetooth SIG. “The Creative Inspire S2 Wireless Speakers, the winner of the 5th annual awards program, exemplifies all these characteristics and more, capturing the best in the evolution of Bluetooth technology.”

Fifty-four devices were submitted for consideration and were carefully tested and inspected by the Bluetooth SIG based on a variety of criteria including interoperability testing, containing expected profiles, and ease of use. Bonus points were awarded to those products that included Experience Icons on the product packaging or the product website, and also for products utilizing the newly adopted Bluetooth V3.0 specification. After ten finalists were selected, one overall winner was chosen.

Back this year was the category of User’s Choice where visitors to www.bluetooth.com/userschoice were given the chance to vote for their top pick from ten previously selected finalists and enter to win one of the finalist products. Voting opened December 8 and remained open until January 3. Over 300 votes were received and one winner was chosen as the fan favorite in addition to the overall Best of CES 2010 winner. The User’s Choice winner for 2010 was the Microsoft Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 6000.

The overall Best of CES winner and the Best of CES User’s Choice winner were unveiled tonight at the Bluetooth SIG member reception. The winning products will be featured in the Spring 2010 issue of the Bluetooth SIG magazine, SIGnature.

Bluetooth wireless technology is the global short-range wireless standard for personal connectivity of a broad range of electronic devices. The technology continues to evolve, building on its inherent strengths – small-form factor radio, low power, low cost, built-in security, robustness, ease-of-use, and ad hoc networking abilities.

This evolution now provides manufacturers and consumers with three options for connecting wirelessly – classic Bluetooth technology for use in a wide range of consumer electronics; Bluetooth high speed technology for the transfer of video, music and photos between phones, cameras, camcorders, PCs and TVs; and Bluetooth low energy for low power sensor devices and new web services within the healthcare, fitness, security, home entertainment, automotive and automation industries.

More than eight new Bluetooth enabled products are qualified every working day and more than 19 million Bluetooth units are shipping per week. There are nearly three billion Bluetooth devices in the marketplace and that number climbs daily, making it the only proven wireless choice for developers, product manufacturers, and consumers worldwide.

The Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG), comprised of leaders in the telecommunications, computing, consumer electronics, automotive and network industries, is driving development of Bluetooth wireless technology and bringing it to market. The Bluetooth SIG includes Promoter group companies Ericsson, Intel, Lenovo, Microsoft, Motorola, Nokia and Toshiba, along with over 12,000 Associate and Adopter member companies. The Bluetooth SIG, Inc. headquarters are located in Kirkland, Washington, U.S.A.