NEW YORK - Last December, the market for handset growth was sluggish, but Bob Bruggeworth, the chief executive officer of RF Micro Devices, told me that his business was not entirely dependent on handset growth to succeed. The reason: RF Micro Devices aimed to get its radio frequency technology into as many different forms of wireless communications as possible, thereby expanding its market–even in an otherwise sluggish sector. I am talking about radio chips for various processes, like Bluetooth for cell phones and wireless local area networks (LANs), which will be increasingly found in cellular phones, as well as radio chips that will be used in next-generation phones.

It’s a good strategy because the market for handsets–which accounts for 90% of RF Micro’s revenue–is only growing at a rate of about 10%. Yet the market growth for sales of radio chips for various processes, like Bluetooth and wireless LAN, is growing at a rate of about 30%. Click here for more…