Renesas Electronics Announces R-Car H2, Offering Highest CPU and Graphics Performance for the Automotive Infotainment Market

R-Car H2 Offers a Complete Solution for the Next-Generation High-End Multimedia and Navigation Systems

SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- Mar 25, 2013 -- Renesas Electronics Corporation , a premier supplier of advanced semiconductor solutions, and Renesas Mobile Corporation, a leading supplier of advanced cellular semiconductor solutions and platforms, today announced the availability of a new member of the R-Car Series of automotive Systems-on-Chip (SoCs). Capable of delivering more than 25,000 DMIPS, the R-Car H2 provides high performance and state-of-the-art 3D graphics capabilities for high-end multimedia and navigation automotive systems. The R-Car H2 is powered by the ARM(R) Cortex(TM)A-15 quad-core configuration running an additional ARM(R) Cortex(TM)A-7 quad-core - the industry's first implementation of a Quad ARM(R) Cortex A15 and the big.LITTLE processing technique in an automotive SoC.

Powerful media hardware accelerators enable features like 4 x HD 1080p video en/decoding including Blu-Ray support at 60 frames per second, image/voice recognition and high-resolution 3D graphics with almost no CPU load. These implemented hardware modules also execute the display content improvements needed for human-machine interface (HMI)/navigation data in parallel to Movie/DVD handling.

The R-Car H2 also features the Imagination Technologies PowerVR Series6 G6400 Graphics Processing Unit (GPU). This is the first worldwide implementation of the GPU into an automotive SoC, which demonstrates the state-of-the-art 3D graphics capability of the R-Car series. The R-Car H2 offers one of the best graphic performance solutions in the automotive embedded market. This GPU is ready to not only support open technologies like OpenGL ES 2.0, but also the OpenGL ES 3.0 and OpenCL standards. Support of the Open graphics standards combined with the R-Car H2's cutting-edge IP and other features makes it the perfect platform to develop next-generation infotainment systems.

Renesas' IMP-X4 core, implemented in R-Car H2 as an optional feature, provides real-time image processing that enables developers to support the emerging trend of augmented reality. In order to fully benefit from the IMP-X4 core, the R-Car H2 also supports up to four independent input camera channels, allowing easy implementations of 360 camera views and image recognition, just an example of the possible driver assistance functions. OpenCV support for IMP-X4 will also be offered. The R-Car H2 offers the highest level of integration of advanced safety concepts and infotainment features in the automotive market today.

The highly efficient bus architecture of the R-Car H2 includes dedicated CPU and IP caches, enabling Renesas to reduce the DDR3 memory bandwidth consumption. In order to ensure adequate memory bandwidth, the R-Car H2 is equipped with two independent DDR3-1600 32-bit interfaces. This allows for much more efficient access to different content simultaneously, compared to a single 64-bit DDR interface. The R-Car family aspires to provide users with the highest capable multitasking processing solution on the automotive market today.

In developing the R-Car series of SoCs, Renesas has leveraged the experiences with mobile products, where there is a strong focus on power consumption reductions. The applied technologies of these mobile products are transferred to Renesas' automotive SoCs to provide unique and effective power optimization and handling.

The R-Car H2 integrates advanced automotive interfaces like Ethernet AVB, MOST-150 and CAN and mass storage interfaces like SATA, USB3.0/2.0, SDcard and PCI Express for system expansion. As a device option, the GPS baseband engine handles all modern navigation standards. Even here, the integration level of R-Car H2 doesn't stop. A 24-bit DSP for codec, high-quality audio processing with hardware sample rate converters and audio mixing is part of the enormous function coverage. The Renesas R-Car family provides the highest level of advanced automotive peripherals in the market today. The Renesas Ethernet AVB solution achieves the fullest implementation of Ethernet AVB on the market, offering the Full Ethernet AVB specification and meeting the specification requirement demands of the automotive market.

With the R-Car H2, Renesas provides not only extremely powerful performance but also a robust ecosystem, including board support packages (BSPs), middleware, development environment and partner solutions, which enables quick prototyping and drastic reduction of high-end product development costs.

"1st generation R-Car series products are well accepted in the car infotainment market," said Ryuji Omura, Executive Manager, Renesas Electronics Corporation. "To cover various customer demands, 2nd generation of R-Car, such as R-Car H2, is aimed at the further expansion of Eco-system with a number of our partners including embedded OS, middleware and Tool vendors."

The R-Car H2's multi-core architecture allows customers to implement real-time features, such as quick-boot, backup camera support, and media processing, parallel to the execution of advanced operating systems such as QNX(R) Neutrino(R) RTOS, Windows(R) Embedded Automotive or Linux. Renesas continuous close collaboration with industry-leading Operating System vendors means that the customers' toolboxes are full with the features and development tools they need to rapidly create and bring to market differentiated high-performance products.

"Renesas and QNX Software Systems have had a long and successful relationship in helping automotive customers deliver state-of-the-art infotainment systems," said John Wall, vice president, engineering services, QNX Software Systems. "The new R-Car H2 automotive SoC demonstrates why we value Renesas so highly as a partner -- it reflects a deep understanding of customer requirements and addresses performance requirements of next-generation infotainment systems. We look forward to having the QNX CAR(TM) application platform supported by the R-Car H2."

"The R-CAR H2 brings together a powerful multi-domain architecture to meet the demands of high-end next generation Automotive Infotainment Systems," said Glenn Perry, General Manager of the Embedded Software Division at Mentor Graphics. "We look forward to working with Renesas, Automotive Tier One Suppliers and OEMs to deliver optimized Linux-based Infotainment Platforms for the application domain and a high performance solution for the real-time domain based on the widely adopted Nucleus RTOS."

"The collaboration with Renesas offers Elektrobit (EB) customers a ready-to-use solution for future automotive HMI development, through one of the worldwide leading systems on chips (SoC) platforms for next-generation car infotainment systems. The integrated GPU (Graphic processing unit) is suitable for demanding 3D graphics applications; it offers one of the best graphical performances in the embedded market," said Martin Schleicher, Vice President Infotainment Products, Elektrobit.

R-Car 2nd Generation Launch Partners Availability

Samples of the Renesas R-Car H2 SoC are available from today, equipped in a 831-pin FCBGA (flip chip ball grid array) package. Mass production is scheduled for mid-2014. (Availability is subject to change without notice.)

About Renesas Electronics Corporation

Renesas Electronics Corporation , the world's number one supplier of microcontrollers, is a premier supplier of advanced semiconductor solutions including microcontrollers, SoC solutions and a broad-range of analog and power devices. Business operations began as Renesas Electronics in April 2010 through the integration of NEC Electronics Corporation and Renesas Technology Corp., with operations spanning research, development, design and manufacturing for a wide range of applications. Headquartered in Japan, Renesas Electronics has subsidiaries in 20 countries worldwide. More information can be found at www.renesas.com.