By Claus Hetting, WiFi NOW CEO
Qualcomm is once again ramping up its Wi-Fi 7 ambitions: The new FastConnect C7700 is designed to power Wi-Fi 7 connectivity for all remaining types of client devices with the ultimate aim of reaching universal Wi-Fi 7 adoption. That means compute and plenty of consumer electronics categories – including gaming consoles, sports cameras, and more – are next in line for a major connectivity quality boost with Wi-Fi 7, Qualcomm says.
Qualcomm’s FastConnect 7700 platform for mainstream smartphones was released earlier this year and now the company has tailored the platform to deliver the same set of high-performance Wi-Fi 7 connectivity features to pretty much every remaining category of client-side devices. The new FastConnect C7700 is indicative of Qualcomm’s expanding Wi-Fi 7 strategy and ultimate goal: Connecting every device everywhere with Wi-Fi 7, the company says.
“We have more than 1,000 Wi-Fi 7 design launched or in development for phones, infrastructure, XR, 5G FWA, you name it. Now it’s time to connect every last compute and consumer electronics device with Wi-Fi 7. And that’s precisely what FastConnect C7700 is for,” says Shishir Gupta, Senior Director of Product Management at Qualcomm. The FastConnect C7700 announcement came in the form of a Qualcomm blog here.
The new FastConnect C7700 in many ways mirrors the FastConnect 7700 smartphone platform but there are substantial differences. To make the platform as flexible as possible it supports all of PCIe, USB, SDIO interfaces and comes with integrated FEMs for fewer device components and a more compact design.
It supports standard Wi-Fi 7 features such as 320 MHz channels, 4kQAM, and MLO for a peak bitrate of 5.8 Gbps and also includes support for the newest Bluetooth standard (Bluetooth 6.0), which comprises Bluetooth Channel Sounding for localisation and proximity-based applications. Finally, it features Wi-Fi ranging (FTM). All of this bodes exceedingly well for continued mass market adoption of Wi-Fi 7 this year.
So what kinds of devices will the new platform connect? In addition to compute – meaning both tablets and laptops – Qualcomm is setting its sights on premium electronics for the home such as streaming boxes, smart TVs, and gaming consoles. But the specs will also comfortably support for example high-end sports cameras and even more exotic categories such as drones or XR glasses. Many consumer electronics devices – such as drones or cameras – may not need continuous connectivity but will benefit from very fast data transfer at short range to automatically upload videos, for example.
The number of commercially released Wi-Fi 7 products reached 1,200 at the end of last year while the total number of 6 GHz capable products now exceeds 5,000. For more also read here. The FastConnect C7700 is sampling now and the first C7700-powered products are expected to be released at the end of this year or early in 2026, Qualcomm says.
/Claus.
