TRaC initiates test services for both ZigBee Health Care and ZigBee Telecoms Services products

TRaC has further extended its position in testing and certification services by adding formal certification testing to the new ZigBee Health Care Profile, within days of the Profile being ratified by the ZigBee Alliance. Alongside the ZigBee Health Care Profile, TRaC has added certification testing for the ZigBee Telecoms Services Profile: together, these new test services mean that TRaC is now providing comprehensive certification routes for the broad range of ZigBee-based consumer devices in those areas which are expected to emerge in the coming weeks and months.

The ZigBee Telecoms Service Profile sets out a global standard for wireless sensor networks, which will supply consumer devices with information, location-based services, entertainment content, payment and billing services, and data-exchange services. It will enable consumer devices with an almost limitless new range of services, based around the mobile phone. Every such offering will require the verification of its compliance to the standards and definitions set out by the ZigBee Alliance: and also, where they interact with other telecoms services, for conformity to the standards that apply to those systems.

To this offering, TRaC has also added the ZigBee Health Care Profile. ZigBee Health Care, is one of the technologies chosen by the Continua Alliance to support its range of health care products. It provides a global standard for low-power, interoperable devices for monitoring-and-management roles in non-acute healthcare situations for use in the home, in medical centres, and in nursing homes, by both patients and healthcare workers.

TRaC’s readiness to test and certify compliance with the ZigBee Health Care Profile Specification is further enhanced by the fact the company has an established service, fully accredited, in testing to several other standards which are very likely to apply to new products which the industry brings forward in this sector; to name but two, the Low Voltage Directive (LVD), and the Medical Devices Directive (MDD).

TRaC’s unique position as a long-established test house in the telecoms industry, coupled with the fact that it is one of only three ZigBee Alliance recognised test houses (and the only one with its main offices in Europe) places the company in a leading position to commence testing to these new standards. TRaC has insight into the processes involved, having contributed to defining the testing requirements as they have evolved, and to the establishment of reference units, also known as “golden units”.