WLAN chipset shipments to increase by 80 percent in '03

About 35 million units of 802.11 chipsets (including all 11x variants) will be sold this year, according to the report "Emerging IC Markets" from IC Insights Inc. From 2002 to 2006, the average annual shipment growth rate for 802.11 products is expected to be 50 percent. The market research firm said that wireless networking will become a standard capability in many electronic systems such as laptops and PDAs.

Late last year, there were about 50 suppliers of ICs for 802.11 WLAN applications. IC Insights believes that this segment has enough room to accommodate many more IC suppliers wanting to join the line.