Chip Crisis Hinder Wi-Fi 6E Development

Wi-Fi 6E aims to accelerate wireless connections with an extension to the 6 GHz band. However, the ongoing global chip crisis means that the associated hardware is spreading only slowly. The standard is probably dying out soon.

When the chip crisis causes standards to be skipped

From the smallest sensor to the large server farm, the chip crisis means that products can either be offered slowly or have to be adapted in all areas. The market research firm Dell’Oro Group now offers an interesting one regarding the diffusion of the latest WLAN standard Wi-Fi 6E insight. Module availability is so poor that companies are rethinking their products: “Supply shortages have pushed manufacturers to focus on improving the availability of popular models by redesigning those models with components that are more readily available,” says Tam Dell’Oro, Founder and CEO.

This situation will not change for the foreseeable future, according to market experts, which is shared by many observers. It is therefore currently expected that availability will remain very limited until the end of 2022. Another problem: the implementation of regulations for use in the 6 GHz spectrum is still difficult for many manufacturers, as standardization by regulatory authorities is also progressing slowly.

Better to switch to Wi-Fi 7

A chain of circumstances that will contribute to the fact that Wi-Fi 6E will probably never be widely used, according to the market researchers: “As Wi-Fi 7 products will be on the market as early as 2023, it is assumed that users will skip 6E According to Dell’Oro’s analysis. “Coverage gaps are a ‘pin in a balloon’ for WiFi 6E.”