A recent marriage of Wind River Systems, Inc. and Lambus Enterprises, Inc. could open the door for gaming options on hand held and wireless units.
Lambus is teaming up with Wind River Systems, Inc., a leading provider of software and services for smart devices in the Internet age, and could provide an avenue for Lambus to take advantage of Bluetooth technology at a later date.
In conjunction with the partnership, Wind River presented its "Cool Customer Design" award to Lambus.
Lambus was given the award for its handheld wireless gaming platform and terminal utilizing their patented WANGO technology.
In teaming up with Wind River, Lambus is able to take advantage of the recently released Tornado for Internet Appliances software bundle.
Lambus is using the Tornado bundle for the development, deployment, and in-field device management of the terminal, and Wind River's Doctor Design services group has been assisting with the development and design of the physical hardware.
The WANGO technology is based on a virtual private network (VPN) gaming and entertainment platform that, by providing streaming video images to the wireless handheld terminals, enables players and operators to take advantage of a global network of games utilizing an Internet web browser. A host server farm controls gaming activities and includes a gaming applications machine -- other participating sites
communicate to the system through PCs over a wide area network (WAN).
Wind River spokesperson Kate Rezucha-Brown, feels the WANGO/Tornado tandem is the perfect fit to take advantage of new and burgeoning market.
"This will allow Lambus to create its own gaming terminal," she said. "You can create any game you want as a developer. So far we haven't gone after the gaming industry aggressively, but this will certainly open a lot of doors for that."
And while the Tornado bundle doesn't run Bluetooth currently, it is compatible and will allow Lambus to explore that option.
"This product isn't using Bluetooth, but Lambus is going to pursue it," Rezucha-Brown said.
Like Wind River, Lambus is a member of the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG).
"If we choose to use this revolutionary technology going forward," said Dan Pacholik, president of Lambus. "Wind River's pre-qualified BlueThunderTM solution would allow us to use the Bluetooth logo and patents, reducing risk, cost, and development time in one fell swoop. Wind River has its finger on the pulse of Bluetooth technology right now, and that's where we want to be also."
Currently, Wind River's WindStormTM application framework allows Lambus to test and simulate WANGO technology applications even before the manufacturing process begins. This saves time and money, eliminating the need for additional staff to help develop and refine the product or rebuild it when changes are made.
For easy updates, WindStorm's JavaTM technology-based applets allow online gaming hall operators to add and delete gaming applets from the hand-held terminals--especially important as more games become available for the platform across the industry.
"The WindStorm architecture was a perfect fit for the WANGO application," said Curt Schacker, vice president of marketing and corporate development at Wind River. "It provides a complete development and run-time solution for their Java-based device, as well as built-in flexibility for in-field updates. As one of the first companies to use Tornado for Internet Appliances, Lambus is leading the way for a plethora of applications and connected smart devices to benefit from the targeted tools available from Wind River."
The handheld venues will allow WANGO-technology-equipped halls and gaming rooms users to compete with other users right down the street or all the way around the world, as long as players are in a regulated district.
Lambus expects the ultimate "pay out" to come when other companies begin to develop a wide variety of games for this open platform, which they hope will become a standard for interactive, regulated, on-line gaming.
Future gaming opportunities may include bingo, keno, roulette, sporting games like baseball and basketball, slot machines, lotteries, card games such as poker, blackjack and solitaire, and even interactive fantasy games.