Bluetooth Low Energy companion ideal for innovative IoT applications

EM Microelectronic have announced the EM9304, a tiny, low-power, SoC optimized for Bluetooth v4.2 low energy enabled IoT, wearable and smart electronics products. The device is architected for flexible usage in a variety of BLE applications. For simple applications such as beacons or smart sensing wearables, the device can be used standalone, or connected to a variety of sensors with standard serial interfaces. Users can also take advantage of a powerful yet low-power 32-bit processor with a FP) and on-chip NVM. Alternatively, it can be connected with a standard MCU or custom ASIC for customers requiring a just a simple and easy-to-implement BLE add-on function to existing applications. The device is claimed to be the smallest BLE v4.2 SoC available on the market and features a 2.4GHz transceiver with state-of-the art receiver sensitivity, and programmable transmit power for optimized current consumption. The device includes a sophisticated on-chip power management system with automatic configuration for 1.5V or 3V batteries. It is compatible with standard 1.5V MCUs such as ultra-low-power watch microprocessors from the company, or with standard 3V microprocessors from many vendors. It comes with 128kB OTP for applications, 48kB RAM to support application development, and up to 20kB RAM of retention data RAM. “EM has been at the forefront of integrated BLE solutions for many years, with the well-established EM9301 BLE controller and the EMBC0x beacons which were among the first on the market” says Michel Willemin, CEO of EM Microelectronic Marin. He adds, “The EM9304 adds flexibility and outstanding performance in a tiny chip, thereby reinforcing EM’s portfolio of low-power integrated solutions like the EM850x Energy Harvesting chips and the sensor fusion co-processing ICs which are paving the way to concrete IoT applications”. Included in ROM is a certified Bluetooth v4.2 stack with proprietary ACI and link layer with a HCI. It supports secure connections, extended packet length, and multiple connections. Current consumption is minimized for all modes of the application utilizing an efficient scheduler and memory manager. Furthermore, the device comes with firmware over-the-air updating routines that can run per application, function, or configuration to minimize download time. Electronica, Hall A4, Stand 206