A draft version of the 802.11n standard failed to pass a first ballot on May 2, leading existing 802.11n vendor Airgo to criticize existing "pre-802.11n" products that have already shipped. Although the 802.11n working group informally compromised on a draft standard in January, the 40-day letter ballot period closed May 2 without a formal 75 percent approval of the Draft Standard 1.0. Forty-six percent of the voters approved the draft, according to members.
The backward-compatible 802.11n standard was designed to gradually replace today"s Wi-Fi, with theoretical throughputs of about 300 Mbits/s, far faster than the 54 Mbits/s that the current 802.11g standard offers today