[By NBC-1TV H. J Yook]The Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) today announced it has appointed Dr. Steven Gray, CTO of Cambridge Silicon Radio, to its Board of Directors. Dr. Gray will serve a two-year appointment starting December 4, 2012, joining current board members from Intel, Motorola, Lenovo, Nokia, Microsoft, Ericsson AB, Toshiba, Apple and Nordic Semiconductor.

“Bluetooth technology is experiencing its second wave of growth, moving into devices and markets where wireless technology previously had no foothold,” said Chris Hansen, chairman of the Bluetooth SIG board of directors. “Steve is a perfect fit, bringing senior technical and strategic understanding to help guide Bluetooth technology’s rapid growth in existing and new markets.”

Dr. Gray started his career in wireless technology at Nokia where with Antti Lappeteläinen and Mauri Honkanen they invented the first iteration of Bluetooth low energy technology, code named Wibree. Wibree was later acquired by the Bluetooth SIG and evolved into the hallmark feature of Bluetooth v4.0. Dr. Gray’s career continued to Intel and Marvell where he acquired additional knowledge of smartphone and mobile device architecture and an extensive understanding of next generation networks, web services and cloud computing from his time with Huawei.

Dr. Gray’s career arc and expertise perfectly mirrors the strategic shift currently happening in the Bluetooth ecosystem. In 2012 alone, ABI Research expects 2 billion Bluetooth enabled products shipped worldwide. From high fidelity wireless audio products from members like Beats by Dre, Jawbone and Bose to ultra power efficient sports and fitness devices from Nike, Polar and Fitbit, Bluetooth is the low power wireless standard of choice for the secure transport of data between devices. Continued Hansen, “securely feeding web services and applications with cloud friendly data is a key component in the shift to cloud computing and more broadly, the Internet of Things – the networked interconnection of everyday objects.”

“The key to seeing the Internet of Things reach projections of 50 to 100 billion devices is low power wireless connectivity,” said Dr. Gray. “Bluetooth SIG members have shipped nearly 10 billion Bluetooth enabled devices since its inception, which far surpasses any other possible wireless tech that is addressing the need for low power radios, and is the natural choice for driving the possibilities of interconnectivity. Essentially, Bluetooth will be the low power wireless technology of choice for creating the Internet of Things. I could not be more delighted to be joining the SIG Board and continuing work on the adoption and development of Bluetooth technology.”