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Multi-layer chip antennas expand Würth Elektronik portfolio

Mon, Jul 11, 2022

Multi-layer chip antennas have been added to the range available from Würth Elektronik, contributing to the miniaturisation of radio applications.

Measuring just 40 x 6.0 x 5.0mm, the WE-MCA antenna (7488918022) covers the 700 to 960MHz and 1710 to 2690MHz frequency ranges. The form factor and slender profile mean the antenna offers an “excellent size-to-performance ratio”, said Würth.

WE-MCA is suited for applications such as GSM 900, WLAN / WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS / GNSS, ZigBee, and mobile communication (4G / LTE). Würth Elektronik offers products for the development of radio applications, including a variety of radio modules and EMC products for high frequency applications, in particular compact IoT and smart building applications. The chip antennas are robust, with an operating temperature range from -40 to +85 degrees C.

To help customers with the layout of miniaturised radio applications and the selection of suitable inductors and capacitors, Würth Elektronik offers antenna matching and characterisation support for its range of multi-layer chip antennas.

The WE-MCA chip antennas are supplied packaged in reels for surface mount assembly, with no restrictions regarding the number of items. Free-of-charge samples are available on request.

Würth Elektronik eiSos Group is a manufacturer of electronic and electromechanical components for the electronics industry. Würth Elektronik eiSos is one of the largest European manufacturers of passive components and is active in 50 countries. Production sites in Europe, Asia and North America supply a growing number of customers worldwide.

The product range includes EMC components, inductors, transformers, RF components, varistors, capacitors, resistors, quartz crystals, oscillators, power modules, wireless power transfer, LEDs, sensors, connectors, power supply elements, switches, push-buttons, connection technology, fuse holders and solutions for wireless data transmission.

Würth Elektronik is part of the Würth Group, specialising in assembly and fastening technology.

http://www.we-online.com

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Renesas’ SmartBond DA1470x SoCs are integrated for wireless connectivity

Wed, Jun 22, 2022

Renesas Electronics has announced the SmartBond DA1470x family of Bluetooth low energy (LE) integrated SoCs for wireless connectivity.

Renesas claimed the DA1470x family to be the only device in the Bluetooth LE space to integrate a power management unit, a hardware voice activity detector (VAD), a graphics processing unit (GPU) and Bluetooth LE connectivity all into a single chip.

This combined functionality provides smart IoT devices with advanced sensor and graphical capabilities and seamless, low power, always-on audio processing. The SoCs are suitable for wearables, such as smart watches and fitness trackers, glucose monitor readers and other consumer medical and healthcare devices, home appliances with displays, industrial automation and security systems, and Bluetooth consoles such as e-bikes and gaming equipment.

“The DA1470x family … enables developers to push the boundaries of connected consumer and industrial applications and future-proof their IoT products to fit the needs of multiple applications, while optimising their bill of materials,” commented Sean McGrath, vice president of the connectivity and audio business division in Renesas’ IoT, Industrial and Infrastructure business unit.

The high level of integration results in “significant cost savings” on the bill of materials (BoM), enabling cost-effective system solutions, according to the company. It also reduces component count on the PCB, enabling smaller form factor designs and freeing up space for additional components or larger batteries. With fewer components on the PCB, the reliability of the system improves, it claimed, delivering a further reduction in the total cost of goods sold (COGS) of the end product.

The wireless SoCs feature a multi core system – with an Arm Cortex-M33 processor as the main application core and Cortex -M0+ as the sensor node controller.

An integrated 2D GPU and display controller supports DPI, JDI parallel, DBI and single / dual / quad serial peripheral interfaces (SPIs) and there is a configurable Mac supporting Bluetooth LE 5.2 and proprietary 2.4GHz protocols.

An integrated 720mA JEITA-compliant USB charger supports rechargeable Li-ion / Li-Po batteries, while an integrated low quiescent current SIMO DC/DC converter of the PMU supplies internal system and external components.

Low power hardware VAD enables seamless and always-on audio processing.

The DA1470x family consists of four new devices, all of which are in mass production and available now.

The DA14706 has already been used in the Xiaomi Mi band 7 wearable activity tracker with a 1.62-inch, 192×490 Amoled display, 120 sports modes and a 15-day battery life for typical use.

The DA1470x family will be demonstrated at Embedded World (21-23 June) in Nuremberg, Germany, at Booth Hall 1-234.

A provider of microcontrollers, Renesas combines its expertise in embedded processing, analogue, power and connectivity to deliver complete semiconductor solutions. These combinations accelerate time to market for automotive, industrial, infrastructure and IoT applications.

http://www.renesas.com

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Integrated listener for NFC wireless charging cuts board footprint by more than half

Wed, Jun 22, 2022

Panthronics has released early samples of what it claimed to be the industry’s first fully integrated NFC wireless charging listener device, the PTX30W.

The single chip PTX30W integrates an efficient rectifier, NFC tag, battery charger and power management as well as protocol handling. The NFC tag supports bidirectional data communication in NFC Type A mode. This enables the transfer of data between the charging cradle and the device under charge, such as the battery’s state of charge or fault indicators, as well as enabling firmware upgrades of both devices.

The PTX30W will work in tandem with an NFC poller such as the Panthronics PTX130W in a charging cradle. It harvests power wirelessly without the need for a microcontroller in the listener device.

It replaces four discrete components with a single chip and occupies less than half the board footprint, to save space in products such as medical sensors, fitness trackers, smart watches, earbuds, hearing aids, smart glasses, smart rings and styluses, said Panthronics.

The PTX30W runs an NFC forum-derived wireless charging protocol that supports power negotiation. This means that the PTX30W will simplify product development, said the company, as it can operate in standalone wireless charging mode with no need for an external microcontroller to run NFC wireless charging operations.

When paired with the Panthronics PTX130W, the NFC poller with the industry’s highest power output, the PTX30W can harvest up to 1W of power for fast charging of lithium-ion batteries, the company claimed.

Mark Dickson, chief marketing officer of Panthronics, said: “NFC wireless charging … operates via a small antenna and supports wireless communication as well as power transfer. Now with the development of the integrated PTX30W, Panthronics is offering device manufacturers a roadmap to even more space savings as well as a simpler system design for faster time-to-market.”

The PTX30W is sampling now to alpha customers. Customer samples will be generally available on the full release of the product later in 2022. Panthronics is presenting the PTX30W prototype demonstration kit at Embedded World (21-23 June) in Nuremberg, Germany, in Hall 1-139.

Founded in 2014, Panthronics is a semiconductor product company headquartered in Graz, Austria. It develops differentiated wireless solutions from the ground up for security and power applications.

http://www.panthronics.com

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Sitara AM62 processors expand edge AI while cutting the power budget

Tue, Jun 07, 2022

Sitara AM62 processors have been released by Texas Instruments. The company said that they help expand edge artificial intelligence (AI) processing and the low power design enables support for dual-screen displays and small size human machine interface (HMI) applications.

According to Texas Instruments (TI), the next generation of HMI will bring new ways of interacting with machines, such as enabling gesture recognition to give commands in a noisy factory environment or enabling the control of machines by phones or tablets with a wireless connection. The AM62 processors bring analytics to edge devices at low power, including suspend states as low as 7mW. There is also no need to design for thermal considerations, said TI, which can give engineers flexibility to deploy new capabilities in size-constrained applications or industrial environments. Adding edge AI features to HMI applications, including machine vision, analytics and predictive maintenance, can advance HMI beyond a mere interface to enable human-machine interaction.

The AM62 processor starts at less than $5.00 to bring low-cost analytics to HMI devices with basic camera-based image processing and edge AI functions, such as detecting and recognising objects, said TI. AM62 processors also enable dual-screen, full HD displays and support for multiple operating systems, including Mainline Linux and Android operating systems. AM62 processors also support both wired and wireless connectivity interfaces.

Additionally, the AM62 processors can reduce power consumption in industrial applications by as much as 50 per cent compared to competing devices, said TI. They can thus enable an application powered by AA batteries to remain on for over 1,000 hours. This is possible, said TI, due to a simplified power architecture. The device features only two dedicated power rails and five power modes. Deep sleep mode at less than 5mW enables longer battery life, while an active power of less than 1.5W is made possible by a core voltage of 0.75V. Reducing system power consumption extends battery life and helps engineers meet design requirements for handheld or size-constrained devices. Achieving optimal power performance is further simplified with the new TPS65219, a companion PMIC specifically designed to meet AM62 processor power supply requirements, said TI.

There is a wide range of tools and resources for AM62 processors including multiple open-source software such as Mainline Linux, to simplify the application development process and help accelerate time to market. A hardware ecosystem includes a third-party evaluation module.

The AM625 and AM623 processors are now available in a 13 x 13mm, 425-pin ALW package. It is available directly from TI and authorised distributors.

TI will showcase the AM62 processors and demonstrate system-level solutions for edge AI and electric vehicle charging HMI applications in at Embedded World in Nuremberg, Germany (21 to 23 June 2022) at its stand in Hall 3A #215.

http://www.TI.com

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Multi-layer chip antennas expand Würth Elektronik portfolio

Renesas’ SmartBond DA1470x SoCs are integrated for wireless connectivity

Integrated listener for NFC wireless charging cuts board footprint by more than half

Sitara AM62 processors expand edge AI while cutting the power budget

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