Energy Micro AS is a fabless semiconductor company

Fabless semiconductor company

A fabless semiconductor company specializes in the design and sale of hardware devices and semiconductor chips while outsourcing the fabrication or "fab" of the devices to a specialized manufacturer called a semiconductor foundry...

 specializing in 32-bit

32-bit

The range of integer values that can be stored in 32 bits is 0 through 4,294,967,295. Hence, a processor with 32-bit memory addresses can directly access 4 GB of byte-addressable memory....

 Flash

Flash memory

Flash memory is a non-volatile computer storage chip that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed. It was developed from EEPROM and must be erased in fairly large blocks before these can be rewritten with new data...

 microcontroller

Microcontroller

A microcontroller is a small computer on a single integrated circuit containing a processor core, memory, and programmable input/output peripherals. Program memory in the form of NOR flash or OTP ROM is also often included on chip, as well as a typically small amount of RAM...

s EFM32

EFM32

The EFM32 is a family of 32-bit RISC Flash microcontrollers designed by Energy Micro AS based on ARM Cortex-M0 or M3 processor core. EFM32 is a mixed-signal microcontroller focusing on supporting ultra low power battery operated solutions...

 and EFR4D Draco RF Trans-receivers. The semiconductor

Semiconductor

A semiconductor is a material with electrical conductivity due to electron flow intermediate in magnitude between that of a conductor and an insulator. This means a conductivity roughly in the range of 103 to 10−8 siemens per centimeter...

 company focuses on 32-bit microcontrollers with ultra low energy consumption. The EFM32 microcontroller family has a CPU that is based on the ARM

ARM architecture

ARM is a 32-bit reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by ARM Holdings. It was named the Advanced RISC Machine, and before that, the Acorn RISC Machine. The ARM architecture is the most widely used 32-bit ISA in numbers produced...

 Cortex-M3

ARM Cortex-M3

The ARM Cortex-M3 is an ARM processor core licensed by ARM Holdings. The core is intended for microcontroller applications.-Features:Key features of the Cortex-M3 core are:* ARMv7-M architecture* Support for Thumb and Thumb-2 instruction encodings...

 architecture and a feature set for low power operation.

The EFM32 products consists of the Gecko microcontroller family and accompanying development tools

History

Energy Micro was founded in 2007. The team consists of semiconductor experienced personnel where the President and CEO Geir Førre previously founded Chipcon

Chipcon

Norwegian company Chipcon AS, headquartered in Oslo and a wholly owned subsidiary of Texas Instruments since 24 January 2006—and from then on known as Texas Instruments Norway AS—develops electronic chips for short-range RF communications.Founded as an ASIC design center in 1996 by...

, now Texas Instruments Norway AS. Co-founder CTO

Chief technical officer

A chief technology officer is an executive-level position in a company or other entity whose occupant is focused on scientific and technological issues within an organization....

 Øyvind Janbu has experience from Chipcon, Texas Instruments

Texas Instruments

Texas Instruments Inc. , widely known as TI, is an American company based in Dallas, Texas, United States, which develops and commercializes semiconductor and computer technology...

, and Tandberg

Tandberg

This article is about the video-conferencing vendor, a Cisco company. Other companies with the same name such as Tandberg Television or Tandberg Data for data storage: see here and here...

. Co-founder and the VP of Engineering, Eirik Jørgensen, has previously worked for Atmel

Atmel

Atmel Corporation is a manufacturer of semiconductors, founded in 1984. Its focus is on system-level solutions built around flash microcontrollers...

. Co-founder and VP of Sales Operation, John Fjellheim, previously worked for Chipcon. In addition to the original founders the following individuals are now part of Energy Micro's management team; Andreas Koller joined from Texas Instruments as the VP of Worldwide Sales and Marketing, Zalina Shaher joined as the VP of Operations and she has former experience from Motorola and Silicon Laboratories, while Phi Hong joined as the VP of Finance.

Energy Micro's Board of Directors include Daniel Artusi, Daniel Hoste, both with several key positions in semiconductor companies. The Chairman is Torleif Ahlsand from Northzone Ventures, and Board Member Steinar Fossen from Investinor joined after the two VC companies

Venture capital

Venture capital is financial capital provided to early-stage, high-potential, high risk, growth startup companies. The venture capital fund makes money by owning equity in the companies it invests in, which usually have a novel technology or business model in high technology industries, such as...

 invested a total of $13 million in Energy Micro's first funding round.

In October 2009 the company released its first product line, EFM32 Gecko MCUs, in February 2010 the EFM32 Tiny Gecko MCUs were announced, and in July 2010 the EFM32 Giant Gecko microcontrollers with USB and large memory was announced.

EFM32 Microcontrollers

EFM stands for Energy Friendly Microcontrollers and the number 32 indicates the 32-bit processor core (ARM Cortex-M3 / M0). Like many other modern 32-bit RISC microcontrollers, EFM32 includes peripherals like GPIO

GPIO

General Purpose Input/Output is a generic pin on a chip whose behavior can be controlled through software....

, ADC

Analog-to-digital converter

An analog-to-digital converter is a device that converts a continuous quantity to a discrete time digital representation. An ADC may also provide an isolated measurement...

, DAC

Digital-to-analog converter

In electronics, a digital-to-analog converter is a device that converts a digital code to an analog signal . An analog-to-digital converter performs the reverse operation...

, Timer/Counter, Watchdog Timer, UART, I²C Interface

I²C

I²C is a multi-master serial single-ended computer bus invented by Philips that is used to attach low-speed peripherals to a motherboard, embedded system, cellphone, or other electronic device. Since the mid 1990s, several competitors I²C ("i-squared cee" or "i-two cee"; Inter-Integrated Circuit;...

, SPI Interface

Serial Peripheral Interface Bus

The Serial Peripheral Interface Bus or SPI bus is a synchronous serial data link standard named by Motorola that operates in full duplex mode. Devices communicate in master/slave mode where the master device initiates the data frame. Multiple slave devices are allowed with individual slave select ...

, RTC

Real-time clock

A real-time clock is a computer clock that keeps track of the current time. Although the term often refers to the devices in personal computers, servers and embedded systems, RTCs are present in almost any electronic device which needs to keep accurate time.-Terminology:The term is used to avoid...

. Many of these peripherals can work without CPU's intervention thereby reducing overall power consumption.

These microcontrollers are available in QFN

QFN

Flat no-leads packages such as QFN and DFN physically and electrically connect integrated circuits to printed circuit boards. Flat no-leads, also known as MicroLeadFrame, is a surface-mount technology, one of several package technologies that connect ICs to the surfaces of PCBs without...

16/24/32/64, QFP

QFP

A QFP or Quad Flat Package is a surface mount integrated circuit package with leads extending from each of the four sides. Socketing such packages is rare and hole mounting is not possible. Versions ranging from 32 to 304 pins with a pitch ranging from 0.4 to 1.0 mm are common...

48/100 and BGA

Ball grid array

A ball grid array is a type of surface-mount packaging used for integrated circuits.- Description :The BGA is descended from the pin grid array , which is a package with one face covered with pins in a grid pattern. These pins conduct electrical signals from the integrated circuit to the printed...

112/120 packages.

Distinctive features

• Configurable GPIO drive strength (upto 20mA)
• Special bus called Peripheral Reflex System (PRS) routes events from one peripheral to another without CPU's intervention.
• Low Energy Sensor Interface (LESENSE peripheral) useful for capacitive / inductive sensing. LESENSE is capable of independent decision making (i.e analog signal level comparison) and wakes up the CPU only when necessary.
• Autonomous and low energy peripherals.
• Different sleep modes.

Product families

EFM32 Gecko MCUs are classified into five categories:

• Zero Gecko - the EFM32ZG series
  • ARM Cortex-M0 processor core
  • Upto 32 MHz operation
  • 4-32 kB program memory, 2-4 kB RAM
• Tiny Gecko - the EFM32TG Series
  • ARM Cortex-M3 processor core
  • Upto 32 MHz operation
  • 4-32 kB program memory, 2-4 kB RAM
  • Includes devices with LCD, LESENSE, OPAMP, AES peripherals
• Gecko - the EFM32G Series
  • ARM Cortex-M3 processor core
  • Upto 32 MHz operation
  • 16-128 kB program memory, 8-16 kB RAM
  • Includes devices with LCD and AES peripherals
• Leopard Gecko - the EFM32LG Series
  • ARM Cortex-M3 processor core
  • Upto 48 MHz operation
  • 64-256 kB program memory, 128 kB RAM
  • Includes devices with USB, LCD, TFT and AES peripherals
• Giant Gecko - the EFM32GG Series
  • ARM Cortex-M3 processor core
  • Upto 48 MHz operation
  • 512-1024 kB program memory, 128 kB RAM
  • Includes devices with USB, LCD, TFT and AES peripherals

EFM32 Technology

EFM32 microcontrollers target very low active power consumption, reduced processing time, very fast wake-up time and ultra-low standby current. To achieve such characteristics, Energy Micro has listed 10 factors for microcontroller design improvements:

1. Very low active power consumption: EFM32 microcontrollers target significantly reduced active mode power consumption. At 32 MHz and 3V the MCU consumes 180 μA/MHz while running real life code from the internal Flash memory.
2. Reduced processing time: Energy Micro build the EFM32 Gecko microcontroller using the 32-bit ARM Cortex-M3 processor core which ARM developed for response and power sensitive applications. Tasks can therefore be executed with few clock cycles which dramatically reduces the active period.
3. Very fast wake-up time: Low power systems continually switch between active- and sleep modes. By minimizing the inefficient wake-up period between deep sleep modes and active mode as little energy as possible is used before the CPU starts processing its tasks.
4. Ultra-low standby current: Low energy usage in standby modes while still performing basic operations is useful for low power applications, and the sleep modes includes RAM and CPU retention, Power-on Reset and Brown-out Detection safety features plus and a Real Time Counter.
5. Autonomous peripheral operation: The EFM32 peripherals can operate in low energy modes without using the CPU. Using autonomous peripherals, an application can reduce power consumption while still performing very advanced tasks.
6. PRS - Peripheral Reflex System: It is possible to directly connect one peripheral to another peripheral without involving the CPU. With this system a peripheral can produce signals which other peripherals can consume and instantly react to while the CPU remains asleep.
7. Well architected Energy Modes: EFM32 microcontrollers have 5 efficient energy modes which give system designers the flexibility to optimize their application for highest performance and longer battery life.
8. Energy efficient peripherals include: a LCD controller driving 4x40 segments at only 0.55 uA, a Low Energy UART performing full communication at 32 kHz while consuming only 100 nA, a 12-bit ADC performing 1 million samples/sec at only 200 uA, the Analog Comparator using as little as 150 nA, the Hardware accelerator for 128/256-bit AES key encryption and decryption in only 54/75 cycles
9. AEM - Advanced Energy Monitoring: The Advanced Energy Monitoring system makes it possible to accurately view a prototype's current consumption data in real time, enabling early identification and removal of adverse current drains. The tools also integrate a full J-Link from Segger, for easy debugging and programming.
10. energyAware Software: The free energyAware software suite supports the EFM32 Gecko development tools. This includes code examples, CMSIS libraries and a Profiler that reads the kits Advanced Energy Monitoring (AEM) system data and enables simple graphical visualization and optimization of application energy consumption and code.

Energy Modes

A wide selection of energy modes available in the EFM32 makes it possible to optimize a systems energy consumption to meet low energy requirements both in active- and sleep modes. The very short transition time between the energy modes in combination with the autonomous operation in the low energy modes favor long sleep times. In all but the deepest energy mode application data is maintained with full RAM retention.

In active mode the industry standard Cortex-M3 RISC processor delivers high performance in terms of computational performance, system response, and low power consumption. Challenging tasks are handled by the processor and the highly integrated peripherals, and the fast interrupt handling and low latency makes the EFM32 very well suited for battery operated applications and systems with critical response times.

Peripherals for autonomous operation

EFM32 microcontrollers use various control techniques for efficient energy management. Low power and customizable peripherals surround the powerful 32-bit ARM Cortex-M3 processor and enable fast autonomous operation and reduce the need for CPU. High overall integration reduce a systems need for external components. Peripherals can react and respond to input from external or internal triggers without any CPU intervention via a system called the Peripheral Reflex System.

EFM32 Development Tools

The EFM32 tools are named "energyAware" and include hardware and software from Energy Micro in addition to third party tools from companies like IAR Systems

IAR Systems

IAR Systems is a Swedish computer technology company working in the area of embedded system development tools. IAR Systems was founded in 1983, and is listed on NASDAQ OMX, Stockholm....

, Keil, Rowley Associates, Segger, Olimex, RK-SYSTEM. The energyAware Profiler is an energy debugging tool that use data from the development kits to display real-time profiling and debugging information of the associated object code. In addition the energyAware Designer generates the initial code for the EFM32 package options, and the user may setup, enable and disable peripherals by clicking on the chosen package. The energyAware Software is available for free from Energy Micro's software page.

EFM32 Application areas

EFM32 devices main areas are in the low power industrial and consumer battery powered applications. This typically consist of energy metering, alarms and security systems, consumer

Consumer

Consumer is a broad label for any individuals or households that use goods generated within the economy. The concept of a consumer occurs in different contexts, so that the usage and significance of the term may vary.-Economics and marketing:...

 products, communication

Communication

Communication is the activity of conveying meaningful information. Communication requires a sender, a message, and an intended recipient, although the receiver need not be present or aware of the sender's intent to communicate at the time of communication; thus communication can occur across vast...

 and computer networking systems, industrial

Industry

Industry refers to the production of an economic good or service within an economy.-Industrial sectors:There are four key industrial economic sectors: the primary sector, largely raw material extraction industries such as mining and farming; the secondary sector, involving refining, construction,...

 sensors, and portable medical- and sport

Sport

A Sport is all forms of physical activity which, through casual or organised participation, aim to use, maintain or improve physical fitness and provide entertainment to participants. Sport may be competitive, where a winner or winners can be identified by objective means, and may require a degree...

/fitness solutions.

External links

• Energy Micro AS
• EFM32 application areas
• Videos of the EFM32 energy friendly microcontrollers
• ARM Community: Energy Micro/EFM32
• Cortex-M3 for Extreme Low-Power Functionality
• EETimes: ARM Extends to Low Power applications
• ARM: Energy Micro Licenses Cortex-M3 Processor
• A Low-Power, ARM-based Microcontroller from Oslo with a Winning Presentation
• energyAware Profiler for EFM32 microcontrollers enables energy efficient Cortex-M3 code