Compact ultra low-power FPGAs for feature-rich mobile devices

Mouser is now stocking the Lattice Semiconductor iCE40 UltraLite FPGA one of the industry's smallest and lowest power field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) for feature-rich consumer mobile and industrial handheld devices. The highly-integrated iCE40 UltraLite devices deliver a flexible logic architecture, programmable I/Os, and hardened IPs and LED drivers - all wrapped into an ultra-low power FPGA and sensor manager with instant-on capability. Designed to accelerate time-to-market with their robust feature sets, the iCE40 UltraLite FPGAs consume 30 percent less power with a 68 percent smaller footprint than similar FPGAs. The devices are based on an advanced 40nm ultra-low power process. Available in densities of 640 or 1K logic cells, the FPGAs come equipped with up to 56 Kbits sysMEM(tm) Embedded Block RAM (EBR) to work with user logic, and feature two on-chip oscillators: a 9.7 kHz LFOSC and a 48 MHz HFOSC. The LFOSC is ideally suited for always-on low-power applications, and the HFOSC can be used for awaken activities. The FPGAs come with a hardened RGB PWM IP and three user-configurable 24 mA constant-current RGB drive outputs. An on-chip 400 mA current drive IR LED output provides a direct interface to an external LED for IrDA functionality. The 100 mA barcode emulation driver output provides a direct interface for applications such as barcode scanning, while the IR LED output and learning mode capabilities can be used to drive applications such as TV remote controls. The iCE40 UltraLite FPGAs achieve flexible, reliable, and secure SRAM memory configuration on through a standard SPI interface and internal nonvolatile configuration memory (NVCM). Since the memory configuration can be stored in nonvolatile (one-time programmable) on-chip memory, no external configuration memory or circuitry is required. They are available in either a 16-ball WLCSP package with a 0.35 mm ball pitch and 1.409mm2 footprint, or a 36-ball BGA package with a 0.4mm ball pitch and 2.5mm2 footprint. The iCE40 UltraLite FPGAs are a perfect solution for a variety of small, power-sensitive Internet of Things (IoT) or wireless applications, including smartphones, tablets, medical devices, wearable devices, multi-sensor management, and RGB lighting controls, says the company.