MCUs & Analog ICs Meet Needs
Wearable devices put extreme demands on the embedded electronics that make them work. Devices spanning across the consumer, fitness and medical markets all need a mix of low-power, low-cost and high-speed processing.
By Jeff Child, Editor-in-Chief
Designers of new wearable, connected devices are struggling to extend battery life for next-generation products, while at the same time increasing functionality and performance in smaller form factors. These devices include a variety of products such as smartwatches, physical activity monitors, heart rate monitors, smart headphones and more. The microcontrollers embedded in these devices must blend extreme low power with high integration. Meanwhile, analog and power solutions for wearables must likewise be highly integrated while serving up low quiescent currents.
Modern wearable electronic devices all share some common requirements. They have an extremely low budget for power consumption,. They tend not to be suited for replaceable batteries and therefore must be rechargeable. They also usually require some kind of wireless connectivity. To meet those needs chip vendors—primarily from the microcontroller and analog markets—keep advancing solutions that consume extremely low levels of power and manage that power. This technology vendors are tasked to keep up with a wearable device market that IDC forecasts will experience a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18.4% in 2020.
— ADVERTISMENT—
—Advertise Here—
MCU and BLE Combo
Following all those trends at once is Cypress Semiconductor’s PSoC 6 BLE. In September the company made its public release of the PSoC 6 BLE Pioneer Kit and PSoC Creator Integrated Design Environment (IDE) software version 4.2 that enable designers to begin developing with the PSoC 6. The PSoC 6 BLE is has built-in Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) wireless connectivity and integrated hardware-based security.
Photo 1
The PSoC BLE Pioneer Kit features a PSoC 63 MCU with BLE connectivity. The kit enables development of modern touch and gesture-based interfaces that are robust and reliable with a linear slider, touch buttons and proximity sensors based using Cypress’ CapSense capacitive-sensing technology.
According to Cypress, the company had more than 2,500 embedded engineer customers registering for the PSoC 6 BLE early adopter program in just a few months. Early adopters are using the flexible dual-core architecture of PSoC 6, using the ARM Cortex-M4 core as a host processor and the Cortex-M0+ core to manage peripheral functions such as capacitive sensing, BLE connectivity and sensor aggregation. Early adopter applications include wearables, personal medical devices, wireless speakers and more. Designers are also using the built-in security features in PSoC 6 to help guard against unwanted access to data. …
Read the full article in the December 329 issue of Circuit Cellar
Circuit Cellar's editorial team comprises professional engineers, technical editors, and digital media specialists. You can reach the Editorial Department at editorial@circuitcellar.com, @circuitcellar, and facebook.com/circuitcellar
