Connecting the Home With a Phone Line Network Chip Set

0272-1732/00/$10.00  2000 IEEE We live in an age of ever-accelerating technological change. The signal event at the end of the second millennium was almost certainly the explosion of the Internet. In 1995 there were 20 million Internet users; by 1998 there were 160 million. We could have 500 million users worldwide by 2003, with over 14 countries having more than 40% of their population online. Those 14 countries represent more than half of the world’s GDP (gross domestic product). Internet-based commerce has grown from essentially zero in 1995 to $50 billion in 1998, and industry observers expect it to reach $1,300 billion by 2003. There is an unprecedented level of investment in Internet-related business ventures—a direct consequence of the appreciation that the “new world order” built on a wired information network will profoundly affect the way we work and live. More than half of US homes today have access to the Internet, primarily via dial-up voice modems. Multibillion-dollar investments are being made in cable modem and DSL (digital subscriber line) infrastructure to upgrade that access to broadband reception. By 2003 we expect one third of connected US homes to subscribe to a broadband always-on access service. Several new broadband digital wireless technologies—such as Fixed Wireless Local Loop (FWLL), terrestrial television broadcast, and satellite broadcast—are being developed and will increase the flood of digital information reaching the home. It is generally assumed that our 50-year-old voice telephony infrastructure will be replaced with an integrated broadband digital network carrying voice, audio, video, and data. What is less well appreciated is that the electronic dendrites of this network will extend beyond the personal computer to every electronic device within the home, connecting literally billions of devices (see Figure 1, next page).