There seems to be a lot of interest in adding wireless communications to embedded projects. Recently several wireless sensor systems have become available in system-on-chip or system-on-module packages. A breakout board for one of these systems might be a good product for SparkFun.
For example, Crossbow sells their OEM MicaZ module for about $50 in small quantities, which has an integrated Zigbee transceiver and Atmel microcontroller:
http://www.xbow.com/Products/productsde … px?sid=140
These modules run the free operating system TinyOS:
While TinyOS has a fairly steep learning curve, it also comes with
hundreds of example programs and is widely used for research and commercial products. Since most people and schools can’t afford to
buy 100 modules at $50 each, Sparkfun might be able to open a new
market by making these available in smaller quantities.
There are other SoC’s with the same functionality, such as the
Chipcon CC2430:
http://www.chipcon.com/index.cfm?kat_id … dok_id=240
but Crossbow’s has the advantage of coming with a free,
complete operating system (and development environment, the nesC cross compiler and associated tools which runs on Windows and Linux).