Jennic

Semiconductor company

Jennic Limited was a privately held UK-based fabless semiconductor company founded in 1996. The company developed microcontrollers that integrated radios with low-power wireless standards support; particularly 802.15.4, 6LoWPAN and Zigbee. It also supplied wired communications products, e.g. ATM[1] and RapidIO[2] cores.

## History

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Founded by CEO Jim Lindop, Jennic's main investors included UK billionaire Eddie Healey.[3][4] In addition to its headquarters in Sheffield, UK, the company had offices in China, Japan, Taiwan, and the US. Customers included IBM, Texas Instruments, Johnson Controls and Honeywell.[5]

Originally focused on IP licensing and design services, Jennic repositioned to focus on fabless semiconductor design in 2004.[6] Jennic also received funding from the Department of Trade and Industry in 2005.[7]

In July 2010, Jennic was acquired by Netherlands-based NXP Semiconductors for $12.2 million, plus an additional $7.8 million in consideration if certain performance targets were met.[8] Approximately 50 UK-based Jennic employees transferred to NXP,[9] and the organization operated as the NXP Low Power RF product line based in Sheffield, England for a time, but in 2020, NXP decided to close the site in Sheffield.

## Technology

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Products developed by Jennic included JenNet, a wireless networking stack based on the IEEE 802.15.4 standard.[10] JenNet-IP included a 6LoWPAN protocol stack.[11] Jennic was the first chipset manufacturer to support this protocol for their 802.15.4 products.[12] In May 2011, NXP announced its intent to release JenNet-IP network layer software under an open source license.[13]

## References

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1. ^ "IBM licenses Jennic ATM technology". 24 March 2003.
2. ^ "Jennic validates Serial RapidIO IP in silicon". 22 June 2005.
3. ^ "The market for mobile light switches" FT.com, 3 January 2007, Retrieved 26 May 2011
4. ^ "Rich List: Sofa tycoon Lord Kirkham sitting pretty" Sheffield Telegraph, 7 May 2011, Retrieved 26 May 2011
5. ^ "The market for mobile light switches" FT.com, 3 January 2007, Retrieved 26 May 2011
6. ^ "WTRS Executive Interview: Interview with Jim Lindop, CEO of Jennic Corporation" Archived 4 October 2011 at the Wayback Machine WTRS Newsletter, 18 July 2006, Retrieved 26 May 2011
7. ^ "Jennic receives £1.5 million DTI grant to fund further growth" D&R Headline News, 28 November 2005, Retrieved 22 October 2009
8. ^ "NXP buys Jennic, boosts short-range RF portfolio" Archived EE Times, 26 July 2010
9. ^ "NXP acquires low power RF specialist Jennic" Archived 22 January 2013 at archive.today EDN, 26 July 2010, Retrieved 26 May 2011
10. ^ "Jennic launches JenNet stack for scalable wireless sensor networks" EPN, 18 December 2007, Retrieved 26 May 2011
11. ^ Rongbo Zhu; Yan Ma (13 November 2011). Information Engineering and Applications: International Conference on Information Engineering and Applications (IEA 2011). Springer. p. 177\. ISBN 978-1-4471-2386-6.
12. ^ Zach Shelby; Carsten Bormann (17 August 2011). 6LoWPAN: The Wireless Embedded Internet. John Wiley & Sons. p. 184\. ISBN 978-1-119-96534-3.
13. ^ "NXP open sources JenNet-IP for Internet of Things" Electronics Weekly, 19 May 2011, Retrieved 26 May 2011

## External links

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* Official site
* NXP Semiconductors