At the Embedded Systems Conference, Infineon Technologies introduced a new family of application-specific 16-bit micro-controllers in the XC16x series. With a feature set and peripheral functions optimised for such industrial control applications as robotics, networked systems and electrical drive systems, the company says the new family of MCUs achieves performance levels that match 32-bit MCUs now used in many of these applications, and can provide cost savings up to 30% compared to available alternatives.
Introducing these devices, Infineon is strengthening its position in the global market for general-purpose MCUs, which is forecast to grow by approximately two-thirds, to more than $22 billion annually, in the next four years, according to Gartner.
"The new 16-bit MCU family is our response to customer requests for solutions that are optimised for industrial control applications," said Chris Hegarty, vice president of the Infineon microcontroller group. "Engineers that until now have had to use more expensive, general-purpose devices now can turn to an elegant, more-powerful implementation of an industry-standard architecture. This fully meets our goal of providing first-class products featuring excellent realtime performance, powerful peripheral sets and a cost point that is very attractive for product developers."
The new XC164S/D/N MCUs offer system designers a choice of features for industrial control applications, including on-chip A/D converters or CAN interfaces and either 64 KB or 128 KB Flash memory. Smart peripheral functions, such as capture/compare, CAN controller and MAC units, offload tasks from the core processor and free-up compute cycles. Additionally, the MCU bus structure allows concurrent operation of several chip subsystems, contributing to a 2x improvement in performance compared to current 16-bit MCUs.
Overall, this flexibility and performance contribute to lower system prices for a wide range of applications, such as card readers, security systems, white goods, home automation, office equipment such as printers and copiers, and scales and conveyer belts in the industrial environment.
Samples of the XC164S/D/N micro-controllers are available, packaged in a 100-pin MQFP package.
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