Next-gen wireless MCUs support new Bluetooth 5.3 LE specification

Renesas Electronics Corporation is developing new MCUs that will support the recently released Bluetooth 5.3 Low Energy. The new devices will be part of the RA Family of 32-bit Arm Cortex-M microcontrollers, joining the RA4W1 Bluetooth 5.0 LE device launched last year.

The new Bluetooth 5.3 specification includes important features, such as enabling receivers to filter out messages without involving the host stack to enhance the receiver duty cycle. It also allows peripheral devices to give preferred channels to a central device to improve throughput and reliability. Also, it adds subrated connections that enhance switching time between low and high duty cycle connections for applications that infrequently need to switch to burst traffic. On top of these features, the direction-finding functionality introduced in Bluetooth 5.1 and the isochronous channels added in Bluetooth 5.2 for stereo audio transmission will be supported in the company's new MCUs. The inclusion of SDR capabilities will enable customers to later migrate to new specification releases.

“We are committed to providing the best performance, ease-of-use, and the latest features on the market,” said Roger Wendelken, senior vice president in Renesas’ IoT and Infrastructure Business Unit. “By offering early, robust support for the Bluetooth 5.3 LE specification, we will enable our RA customers to be first to market with their next-generation products.”