Agilent Technologies Inc of the US plans to establish a wireless local area network (WLAN) equipment testing center in Taipei next year, a company official said yesterday.
The Taipei facility -- known as a "interoperability certification lab" -- will offer testing and certification services for wireless applications. The lab will be authorized by Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance (WECA), an international wireless technology association.
The move highlights Taiwan's dominant global position in producing wireless interface cards, the head of the company said.
"Taiwan has such a strong global position in wireless LAN. It's really a terrific accomplishment and something that we want to continue to work on," said Edward Barnholt, president and CEO of Agilent.
A WLAN interface card is a small circuit board that is installed in a personal computer so that users can connect to the Internet without wires.
According to the Ministry of Economic Affairs, Taiwan will ship out more than 12 million WLAN cards this year, accounting for about 80 percent of the global WLAN-card market.
Spun off from Hewlett-Packard in 1999, Agilent Technologies provides communications, electronics and life science testing, and analysis and measurement services.
Products certified as Wi-Fi (wireless-fidelity) by WECA identifies compatibility, even when such products are produced by different manufacturers.
All WLAN cards have to pass the Wi-Fi testing before being sold in the US market.
Similar certification labs have been established in the USA, Europe, Japan and Singapore.
A government official said the lab will speed up the time it takes for manufacturers to get their products to market.
"When companies can resolve problems and get certified in Taiwan, efficiency will be increased," said Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Shih Yen-hsiang (施顏祥).
Some 350 WLAN components will be sent to WEFA for certification this year, of which more than 50 percent or 180 units are from Taiwan.
Executives in the sector applauded the announcement.
"This is very positive," said Tony Liu (劉信良), a director at Global Sun Technology Inc (陽慶電子), a WLAN-interface-card maker. "Taking transportation and other costs into account, we will be able save about NT$600,000 per year when we can test our products locally," Liu said.
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