Li-Fi: a new technology 100 times faster than Wi-Fi

     Li-Fi: a new technology 100 times faster than Wi-Fi

                                

It was September 2015. Lucibel, a French company specializing in LED lighting, tested with a Li-Fi Sogeprom luminaire prototype to broadcast, via light, bi-directional Internet connection to 1 Gb / s. Very promising, this technology posed as a credible alternative to Wi-Fi. This week in Barcelona, the MWC 2016 brought to light this technology more than promising. Lighting.

                  

Switching light to connect to the Internet, in summary, what we promised the Li-Fi. There appeared a decade, this technology is regularly presented as an alternative to Wi-Fi, against which it would be safer. So far, Li-Fi boom, however, remained confidential. The data transmission was in effect than unidirectional and the system remained dependent on LED lighting, yet widespread. But things are evolving rapidly ...

The company Lucibel unveiled in September 2015 a Li-Fi fixture prototype that provides high-speed Internet connection bidirectional 1 Gb / s. This solution has been tested since June 2015 in various meeting rooms of the Paris headquarters of the Sogeprom, a subsidiary of Société Générale dedicated to real estate. Lucibel is a French company specializing in LED technology behind the Li-Fi.

The principle of walrus

The Li-Fi acronym assembles English words light to light, and fidelity to fidelity. This technology is to use the modulation high frequency light to encode and transmit information, rather like Morse. While Wi-Fi uses radio portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, Li-Fi works with the visible part of the latter is called the optical spectrum. If the first demonstration of Li-Fi is attributed to Alexander Graham Bell in the 1880s with his camera phone, it is the advent of LED lighting that brings out the technology.

Led can withstand intensity microvariations who make the switch up to several million times every second. This very high frequency provides broadband may compete in performance with ADSL, which is higher than that of Wi-Fi. Currently, the theoretical maximum throughput of Li-Fi devices such as that proposed is Lucibel 1 Gb / s. But there two years ago, researchers at the Fraunhofer Heinrich Hertz Institute in Berlin were able to achieve 3 Gb / s.

                   

(Looks like this Li-Fi fixture prototype that Lucibel tests in the premises of the Sogeprom. The LED lighting is connected by Ethernet to the network and communicates with devices via infrared transmitter that looks like a big smoke detector.)

To operate, the Li-Fi device Lucibel requires that lighting is connected to the Internet through an Ethernet wired connection as well as a transceiver that modulates, and receives the signal from the connected device. It can be a computer, smartphone or tablet which must, also, be equipped with a transceiver.

Li-Fi is operating within the limits of the light cone that projects the light usually located the ceiling in order to provide the widest possible coverage. This has both drawbacks and advantages. Disadvantages because it restricts use to a fixed area such as an office or a room, and does not offer the mobility that allows Wi-Fi. But the advantage of Li-Fi is that it does not cross opaque walls, which limits the risk of piracy. In its press release, Lucibel estimates that the Li-Fi system can provide an appropriate solution for banks, research and development centers and other so-called sensitive industries.

Light waves instead of radio waves

The company also highlights the health argument, asserting that the "light waves are harmless to the human body, or even beneficial at certain frequencies." In other words, Li-Fi could address the issues related to EHS and the harm that is ready to radio waves, although this last point is debatable. Lucibel considers in any case that this technology poses as alternative to radio waves in some sensitive locations such as hospitals, schools, etc.

                               

The hexagonal company has not yet reported on the price of its Wi-Fi equipment it plans to launch marketing this year. However, the development of Li-Fi is dependent on the democratization of LED lighting. Prices continue to fall but the benefits of this type of lighting is still misunderstood by the general public.

In late August 2015, the government announced an ambitious plan to push the adoption of LED bulbs. Ségolène Royal handling the case said then, "I asked EDF to set up the distribution of a million light bulbs Led".