Ultra-low power 32-bit microcontroller with advanced power modes from Dolphin Integration

Grenoble, France – November 30th, 2015 -- In order to meet the long battery-life requirements in the growing market of IoT devices, energy saving becomes a paramount concern, specifically the reduction of static power consumption when devices spend up to 99.9 % of the time in an inactive mode.

The RISC-351 Zephyr-RR is an energy efficient 32-bit microcontroller core that enables achieving ultra-low power consumption by combining innovative low-power techniques with energy saving modes, making it ideal for battery-operated applications which spend most of their operating time waiting for a wake-up event.

In order to provide further flexibility in power management than traditional 32-bit competitors, the RISC-351 Zephyr-RR introduces an advanced state "Retention mode" where essential registers are saved either by using retention registers for the most fundamental ones, or by copying state to/from memory when going to or leaving retention mode for large ones such as the register file. This advanced state retention mode enables to divide the power consumption by 1,000 compared to classic power modes where all core and peripheral clocks are gated (stop mode).

Because power modes cannot be implemented without taking into account the “wake-up duration”, users have to define the optimal trade-off between the overall power consumption and the lag-time to resume normal operation after entering into a low-power mode. This trade-off depends on the number of stored registers, voltage switching, etc.

As the impact on the embedded software remains a crucial concern for most users, even though the use of the advanced state of retention is a simple software increment with respect to standard retention, a library of dedicated functions is provided with Zephyr-RR in order to make the use of low-power modes straightforward.

Thanks to our SmartVision™ IDE, software developers can perform power consumption Profiling in order to go further in the power optimization.

For further power consumption optimization, the RISC-351 Zephyr-RR can be implemented with low-power standard cell libraries and voltage regulators from Dolphin Integration.

Contact nelly.albertini@dolphin.fr for more information on Zephyr-RR

About Dolphin Integration

Dolphin Integration contributes to "enabling low-power Systems-on-Chip" for worldwide customers - up to the major actors of the semiconductor industry - with high-density Silicon IP components best at low-power consumption.

The "Foundation IP" of this offering involves innovative libraries of standard cells, register files and memory generators. The "Fabric IP" of voltage regulators, Power Island Construction Kits and their control network MAESTRO enable a flexible assembly with their loads. They especially star the "Feature IP": from high-resolution converters for audio and measurement applications to power-optimized 8 or 16 and 32 bit micro-controllers.

Over 30 years of experience in the integration of silicon IP components, providing services for ASIC/SoC design and fabrication with its own EDA solutions, make Dolphin Integration a genuine one-stop shop addressing all customers' needs for specific requests.

It is not just one more supplier of Technology, but the provider of the DOLPHIN INTEGRATION know-how!

The company strives to incessantly innovate for its customers’ success, which has led to two strong differentiators:

• state-of-the-art “panoplies of Semiconductor IP components” for high-performance applications securing the most competitive SoC architectural solutions,
• a team of Integration and Application Engineers supporting each user’s need for optimal application schematics, demonstrated through EDA solutions enabling early performance assessments.

Its social responsibility has been from the start focused on the design of integrated circuits with low-power consumption, placing the company in the best position to now contribute to new applications for general power savings through the emergence of the Internet of Things.