Radio wave ranging sensor is sensitive enough for gesture initiation 

Radio wave ranging sensors announced by Socionext are able to detect minor movements in positional information for tracking. The SC1240 series radio wave ranging sensors use the 60GHz band and have a built-in signal processing circuit for detecting the position and movement of a person.

The sensor that complies with the global broadband 60GHz radio equipment standard. It is able to detect the position and movements of a person, said Socionext and its high precision sensing and built-in signal processing circuits use a 6.8GHz (57.1 ~ 63.9GHz) wide band to detect minor movements as positional information, enabling it to be used in advanced applications such as tracking human movements and operation by gestures.

The sensor has built-in range finding and angle calculating signal processing circuitry, believed to be the first in the industry. It is based on the company’s mmwave radio communication LSIs and 24GHz radio wave range finding sensors. 

The integrated SC1240 series uses 3D position information without the need for high frequency or advanced signal processing technology, claimed Socionext. It includes multiple antennas, wireless circuitry, ADCs, FIFO memory, SPI (serial peripheral interface), a sequencer that flexibly changes the duty cycle and controls power consumption, and a signal processing circuit for distance measurement and angle calculation. It also provides an autonomous activation function. These features allow users to easily obtain the height and positional data on the X, Y and Z planes for precision sensing actions such as the detection of multiple people or gesture without contact.

Average power consumption is 0.72mW at 0.1 per cent duty cycle operation, reported Socionext. The sensor is supplied in an FC-BGA measuring 4.0 x 7.0 x 1.2mm.

Sample shipments are scheduled for Q2 2022, and mass production in Q1 2023.

Socionext supplies SoCs for use in automotive, data centre, networking and smart devices.

Socionext Inc. is headquartered in Yokohama, and has offices in Japan, Asia, the United States and Europe.

Socionext Europe has headquarters is in Frankfurt, Germany with offices in Munich, Germany and Maidenhead, UK. The Munich Design and Support Centre specialises in embedded graphic, hardware and software product development for the automotive sector. The Maidenhead office in the UK supports Socionext’s IP Development & Engineering Centre with a focus on high speed data conversion IP. Socionext Europe offers customers a range of custom SoCs. 

http://www.socionext.com 

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Charger IC is wireless power transfer-compatible

A multi-functional, compact charging IC for lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries, the XC6810, supports wireless power transfer.

Available from Torex Semiconductor, the XC6810 series of charging ICs for Li-ion batteries are suitable for wearables, hearables or IoT devices. Functions include charge and discharge control as well as wireless power supply support. 

Charging current is 1.0 to approximately 25mA, making it suitable for small Li-ion batteries. The ICs can provide a wide charging range of 3.8 to 4.4V.The XC6810 series are equipped with shutdown function to suppress battery discharge when stored or not in use as well as a wake-up function, activated using an external push button, to extend the life of batteries and devices. 

In addition to the conventional LED-driven display, a terminal indicates the charging status, showing charging level by frequency. It also supports charging monitoring using a microcontroller. 

The XC6810 is equipped with a battery voltage monitoring function, which can directly monitor the battery voltage through a microcontroller, or a low battery voltage notification function. 

The wide input voltage range of 3.5 to 28V supports wireless power and energy harvester charging, confirmed Torex. For contact-type charging using a cradle, for example, one version has a terminal which modulates the power supply line for the charging status to be notified by two-wire communication. The charging status and charging control can be displayed through the cradle. 

Torex Semiconductor provides CMOS power management ICs for battery powered and energy efficient applications. The company specialises in CMOS analogue technology, with LDO voltage regulators, voltage detectors and DC/DC converters in its product portfolio.

http://www.torexsemi.com

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Infineon combines Airoc Wi-Fi / Bluetooth in Nvidia Jetson for edge AI

Airoc Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity provides Wi-Fi 6 / 6E and low power wi-Fi 5 connectivity to Nvidia’s Jetson system on modules (SoMs) for developers to accelerate artificial intelligence (AI) -enabled edge devices.

AI at the edge devices require reliable and instant Wi-Fi cloud connectivity for lifecycle management functions like deploying AI models through over the air (OTA) updates.

“In congested network environments, AI devices often encounter disconnections or low-data throughput, leading to poor user experience, explained Infineon. The Airoc Wi-Fi family delivers low latency, robust connectivity and high data throughput streaming, said Sivaram Trikutam, vice president, Wi-Fi product line at Infineon. 

The Wi-Fi will be used for AI applications which require real time blending effects from live action to computer-generated images or videos, such as gaming and AR / VR (augmented reality / virtual reality) in industry applications. In these applications, high-throughput and low-latency wireless transmissions are critical and require simultaneous processing and streaming of data. Infineon said its Wi-Fi 6E solution, operating in the 6.0 to 7.0GHz band, minimises latency and prevents interruptions due to congested wireless networks. This is combined with the fast processing power of the Nvidia Jetson platform for AI-enabled devices in, for example, robotics, smart cities, healthcare, industrial, retail, energy and agriculture where processing in the cloud is blended with edge processing.

The Airoc CYW4373, CYW5459x and CYW5557x are available to design now. The Nvidia Jetson compute platform is claimed to be the leading AI at the edge compute platform with over one million developers. With pre-trained AI models, developer software development kits and support for cloud-native technologies across the full Jetson line up, intelligent machine manufacturers and AI developers can build and deploy software defined features on embedded and edge devices.

http://www.infineon.com

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LTE-M and NB-IoT module

Industrial IoT, connected or smart agriculture, logistics and smart metering applications can use the Adrastea-I module by Würth Elektronik. The  low power, multi-band LTE-M and NB-IoT module measures just 13.4 x 14.6 x 1.85mm but integrates GNSS, an Arm Cortex M4 and 1Mbyte flash memory which is reserved for user application development. 

The module is based on the Sony Altair ALT1250 chipset. Certified by Deutsche Telekom, the Adrastea-I module can be quickly integrated into end products without additional labels, industry-specific certifications (GCF) and operator approvals whenever a Deutsche Telekom IoT connectivity (SIM card) is used.

The Adrastea-I module has multi-band support and can be operated through one of two cellular communication technologies (LTE-M and NB-IoT). This enables the support for international, multi-regional coverage. For example, wherever LTE-M does not have coverage, the Adrastea-I can be configured to use NB-IoT instead, and vice versa. The module is 3GPP Release-13-compliant, upgradable to Release-14. Adrastea-I module is optimised for low power consumption and enhanced coverage. Its small dimensions make it suitable for size-constrained applications such as wearables.

The Adrastea-I module has integrated GNSS, supporting both GPS and GLONASS satellite systems. Integrated GNSS make it suitable for asset tracking applications where infrequent position updates are required.

The Adrastea-I module’s integrated Arm Cortex M4 microcontroller, 1Mbyte flash and 256Kbyte RAM are available exclusively for customer application development.

Sony Altair provides a software development kit (SDK), sample code examples, documentation and tools to accelerate innovation and product development on the integrated Arm Cortex M4 microcontroller.

Deutsche Telekom has certified the Adrastea-I module for multiple European LTE-M and NB-IoT networks. Würth Elektronik eiSos maintains a partnership with Deutsche Telekom IoT for Connectivity (IoT SIM card). The certification confirms that end-products using the Adrastea-I module will interoperate properly on Deutsche Telekom’s various networks.

The Adrastea-I module and its evaluation kit are available in stock now, confirmed Ravindra Singh, product manager, at Würth Elektronik eiSos.

http://www.we-online.com

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