Tag Archives: MCU

Silicon Labs has announced an Arm Cortex-M33 based family of secured wireless microcontrollers covering Matter, OpenThread, Zigbee and Bluetooth LE. Called xG26, it consists of MG26 devices for Matter, OpenThread and Zigbee, BG26 devices for Bluetooth LE and Bluetooth Mesh, and PG26 devices for the same processing power without wireless transceivers. “As users from consumer to industrial sectors extract more ...

Renesas is claiming “industry’s lowest overall power consumption for general purpose 32-bit MCUs” for its Arm Cortex-M23 based RA0 series. Consumption is 84.3μA/MHz and the company “offers a ‘software stand-by’ mode that reduces power consumption by a further 99% to 0.2 µA”, it said. Wake from this mode is in 4.6μs or less if the internal 32MHz oscillator is used. ...

Microchip has created an AVR microcontroller series with 12Mbit/s USB 2.0 and code protection. “As the next generation of Microchip 8-bit MCUs to integrate USB connectivity, the AVR DU family is designed to provide enhanced security features,” said the company. Protection comes from permanently disabling write capability within the programming and debug interface after initial programming, and handing over update ...

Alif Semiconductor has put an Arm Ethos-U55 neural processor alongside a Bluetooth Low Energy radio in a microcontroller for AI and machine learning workloads – all in a tine WLCSP package. It is called Balletto. “Balletto gives manufacturers the opportunity to implement AI/ML functions such as speech recognition, adaptive noise cancellation, vocal targeting and beam forming in true wireless stereo ...

NXP has finally revealed the wireless versions of its MCX microcontrollers, first announced in mid-2022. “Featuring the industry’s first MCU with Bluetooth Channel Sounding, NXP’s MCX W series enables edge devices with secure multi-protocol wireless for Matter, Thread, Zigbee and Bluetooth Low Energy,” according to the company, which explained: “Bluetooth Channel Sounding standard improves the accuracy and security of distance ...

Resasas has put its in-house developed 32bit RISC-V core into a few-pin general-purpose MCU series, following earlier RISC-V projects with Anders and SiFive. Announced last November, the core implementation can accommodate various standard RISC-V options, to which Renesas has added its own options including: a stack monitor register to protect against rogue software, a dynamic branch prediction unit improve the ...

Renesas has added a 24bit ΣΔ (sigma-delta) ADC to a 48 MHz Arm Cortex-M23 microprocessor, as well as dual-bank code flash for over-the-air firmware updates. “RA2A2 devices offer multiple power structures and voltage detection hardware to realise energy-efficient operation as low as 100µA/MHz in active mode, and 0.40µA in software stand-by mode,” according to the company. “An independent power supply ...

STMicroelectronics is emphasising power consumption and security for a range of 56MHz Arm Cortex-M0+ microcontrollers. Called STM32U0, the “MCUs can reduce energy consumption by up to 50% compared to previous product generations”, said the company. It “allows more designs to go battery-free, running solely from an energy-harvesting system such as a small photovoltaic cell”. On the same day, ST announced ...

Renesas is aiming at industrial robots with a microcontroller that combines AI vision and real-time control processing. Called RZ/V2H, the ICs include the company’s DRP-AI3 ‘dynamically reconfigurable processor’ AI accelerator – recently revealed at ISSCC in San Francisco – in 10Top/s/W form. “Pruning technology employed in the DRP-AI3 accelerator improves AI computing efficiency, boosting inference performance to 80Top/s,” according to ...

NXP has fleshed out the MCX A microcontroller series it announced in 2022. The ‘A’ series is the lower-cost branch of the MCX family, and like other MCX MCUs, the devices are built around an Arm Cortex-M33 core – this is the security-enabled M3. The first parts are MCX A14x (48MHz core) and MCX A15x (96MHz core), which come in ...