Category: Nordic Semiconductor

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NORDIC Bluetooth 5, IEEE 802.15.4 , Thread and Cellular IoT Ultra Low Power Wireless Solutions from SEMICONDUCTOR.

Posted by Charbax – June 11, 2020
Nordic Semiconductor provides ultra-low power (ULP) wireless chips that can run for a long time from small power sources, like watch batteries. NORDIC the latest version of Bluetooth is Bluetooth5 by NORDIC .It represents the greatest advancements in the specification since Bluetooth 4.0 and the introduction of Bluetooth Low Energy. Errata High throughput, Long range, advertising extensions, increased broadcast capacity, improved co-existence. IEEE 802.15.4: is a standard for low data rate, low power networks. IEEE 802.15.4 defines the physical (PHY) and Medium Access Control (MAC) layers and forms the basis for numerous upper layer networking specifications including Thread, 6LowPAN, Zigbee and Wireless HART. IEEE 802.15.4 is supported by the Nordic nRF52840 multi-protocol SoC. Thread is a standards-based IPv6-based mesh networking protocol developed for simply and securely connecting products around the home to each other, to the internet and to the cloud. Cellular IoT (A low power LTE-M and NB-IoT solution for wide area network deployments). The LTE-M and NB-IoT standards are open standards created by 3GPP to allow wide deployment of IoT nodes while leveraging existing cellular infrastructure. The LTE protocols are designed for unparalleled scalability in number of nodes while maintaining good Quality of Service. Both technologies offer eDRX and PSM which are techniques for lowering the power consumption compared to traditional LTE. In eDRX, device and network agree exact times when the device will be ready to receive data.

https://www.nordicsemi.com/en

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Nordic Semiconductor nRF5340 dual Arm Cortex-M33 at Embedded World 2020, NB-IoT, LTE-M, BLE, Quuppa

Posted by Charbax – March 11, 2020

Nordic Semiconductor's Bjørn Kvaale shows the latest cellular IoT NB-IoT, LTE-M, GPS and BLE Bluetooth 5.1 Direction Finding, Zigbee and Thread solutions for development on the market today. Showing their Bluetooth Low Energy solutions including the newly launched nRF5340 SoC featuring dual Arm Cortex-M33 processors, truly secure, with two flexible processors, the advanced feature set, and an operating temperature up to 105 °C, makes it the ideal choice for professional lighting, advanced wearables, and other complex IoT applications The nRF5340 PDK is the preview development kit for the nRF5340 SoC, containing everything needed to get started with development, on a single board. The PDK supports development with an extensive range of wireless protocols. It supports Bluetooth Low Energy, including the Long Range and high-speed 2 Mbps features. Mesh protocols like Bluetooth mesh, Thread and Zigbee can be run concurrently with Bluetooth LE, enabling smart phones to provision, commission, configure and control mesh nodes. NFC, ANT, 802.15.4 and 2.4 GHz proprietary protocols are also supported. The PDK is bundled with an NFC antenna that quickly enables testing of nRF5340’s NFC-A tag peripheral. A SEGGER J-Link debugger is on the board, enabling full-blown programming and debugging, of both the nRF5340 SoC and external targets. All analog and digital interfaces, and GPIOs are available via headers and edge connectors. The kit is Arduino Uno Rev3 hardware compatible, meaning it can be easily interfaced with external device shields, including the Power Profiler Kit. Four buttons and four LEDs simplify input and output to and from the nRF5340 SoC, they are all user-programmable. An on-board external memory is connected to the 96 MHz QSPI peripheral in the nRF5340 SoC. The PDK is typically powered with USB, but can be powered by a wide range of sources, within the supply range of 1.7 to 5.0 V. In addition to USB, it can be powered with external source, but also includes a CR2032 battery holder and a Li-Po battery connector, for in-field testing. Current consumption can be measured by using the dedicated current measurement pins. The nRF Connect SDK is the software development kit for the nRF5340 SoC, and it has board support for the nRF5340 PDK.

Taiyo Yuden world leader capacitor manufacturer, shows BT5 modules with Nordic Semi

Posted by Charbax – October 16, 2019

Foundries.io Zephyr microPlatform (ZmP) at Embedded World 2019

Posted by Charbax – March 29, 2019

Foundries.io demonstrates OpenThread on Zephyr with Blockchain data publishing controlling Smart Lights and Candy Dispenser – Foundries.io showcases their Zephyr microPlatform (ZmP) using OpenThread and 802.15.4. Providing an OpenThread gateway which acts as a smart speaker enabling users to issue voice commands like “Hey Google, turn it on” to turn on a light, or “Hey Google, start it” to dispense candy. The connected lights will be running ZmP with OpenThread, and the candy dispenser will using 6lowpan over BLE.

The Zephyr Project at Embedded World 2019

Posted by Charbax – March 29, 2019

The Zephyr Project joins some 1,000 exhibitors at Embedded World in Nurnberg, Germany, with Zephyr Project members including Antmicro, Foundries.io, Intel, Nordic Semiconductor, NXP and SiFive, with offer interactive IoT demos powered by the Zephyr RTOS, which supports multiple hardware architectures and is built with safety and security in mind.

The Antmicro and Renode demo showcases how the open source Renode simulation framework that can be used to test multi-node Zephyr setups, including ARM and RISC-V based platforms. Using human-readable scripts and configuration, Renode allows you to easily create complex CI installations, enabling better testability of real products. You will see how to test production-ready code without the hassle of connecting multiple pieces of hardware together against corner-case conditions unachievable in testing rigs.

NXP i.MX 6SoloX (UDOO Neo) with RPMsg Protocol, a Multicore demo with Linux running on A9, Zephyr running on M4 – This demonstration shows how to leverage asymmetric co-processors of modern SoCs on the example of i.MX6SoloX and Udoo Neo board. The embedded Cortex-M4 core is running Zephyr RTOS which implements various low speed serial peripherals (UART, SPI, I2C) in software using GPIO. Cortex-M4 communicates with the embedded Cortex-A9 core running Linux Kernel using the RPMsg protocol. On the Linux side a kernel module is used to present implemented serial peripherals to the user space as regular serial, SPI or I2C interface (e.g. /dev/ttySx). The benefits of such approach consist in the possibility of extending existing set of peripherals without any additional hardware cost and the possibility to place selected peripheral at virtually any available GPIO pin. Thanks to exporting the interfaces to the user space, it can be accessed for example by a Python script.

Intel S1000 Speech Kit showcases basic Alexa functionality

Nordic Semiconductor Gaming Mouse, Zephyr on an nRF52-based low-latency, high report rate gaming mouse prototype

Zephyr on the Nordic nRF91 Development Kit, including a BLE to LTE gateway

SiFive Demo, Zephyr Running on a SiFive HiFive1 Development Board

Zephyr running as a guest on ACRN Hypervisor

Nordic Semiconductor nRF9160 ARM Cortex-M33 SiP with LTE-M/NB-IoT

Posted by Charbax – March 26, 2019

The Nordic Semiconductor nRF9160 is a compact, highly-integrated Low power System-in-Package with integrated LTE-M/NB-IoT modem and GPS for cellular IoT (cIoT) designs, featuring ARMv8-M Arm Cortex-M33 application processor solely for applications, a full LTE modem, RF Front End (RFFE) and power management system. Nordic Semiconductor claims that the nRF9160 is the most compact, complete and energy-efficient cellular IoT solution on the market. The integrated modem supports both LTE-M and NB-IoT and can operate globally removing any need for regional variants. All power saving features including eDRX and PSM are supported as is with IPv4/IPv6 support up to transport and security (TCP/TLS) level. The modem firmware is upgradable via secure, encrypted Firmware Over The Air (FOTA) updates. The Arm Cortex-M33 application processor is supported by 1MB of flash and 256kB RAM making advanced application development possible in a single device solution. A GPS receiver is integrated into the radio offering various modes of operation to suit a wide selection of applications that employ location-tracking functionality. A broad selection of general interfaces and peripherals and are included on nRF9160 including 12-bit ADC, RTC, SPI, I²C, I²S, UARTE, PDM and PWM. Security is best-in-class with Arm TrustZone technology for isolation and protection of normal and secure zones for firmware and elements of hardware including memory and peripherals. Arm TrustZone helps build solid and secure ioT applications that feature secure boot, trusted firmware updates and root of trust implementations without performance compromise. Arm CryptoCell enhances security still further by offering cryptographic and security resources to help to protect your IoT applications from various attack threats. CryptoCell is designed for high performance cryptography solutions optimized for energy-constrained devices. The nRF9160 supports both SIM and eSIM for connection and authentication with mobile network operators. The nRF9160 hardware and development kits are now in production and is suitable for full end-to-end sensor to cloud development.

Google IoT Demo for Zephyr RTOS With TF-M Secured on Musca

Posted by Charbax – October 6, 2018

In this demo, the Trusted Firmware M is providing the SPE and JWT sign, Zephyr is providing the NSPE and The Google IoT application is running on Zephyr using secure services from Trusted Firmware M.

- Platform Security Architecture (PSA) is an IoI security framework being developed by Arm.
- Trusted Firmware M (TF-M) is an open source project to provide PSA compliant secure firmware for M profile devices.
- Zephyr is a Linux Foundation Collaboration Project to provide a small, scalable RTOS for connected, resource constrained device.
- Arm Musca-A1 subsystem based on Armv8-M which allows partitioning the SW execution in Secure and Non Secure domain.

Zephyr Project with Linaro, Open Source Foundries, Nordic, Intel, Bluetooth Mesh demos

Posted by Charbax – March 8, 2018

The Zephyr Project is a scalable real-time operating system (RTOS) supporting multiple hardware architectures with more than 82 development boards supported already, with additional hardware support being added regularly, optimized for resource constrained devices, and built with security in mind. The Zephyr Project wants to be the open source "Linux of Embedded". Zephyr Project members include Linaro and the Open Source Foundries, Intel, NXP, Synopsys, Nordic Semiconductor, DeviceTone, runtime.io, Texas Instruments, Oticon and more. This video features functional prototype devices using the Zephyr kernel, including a functional Bluetooth Mesh network, a low energy Bluetooth controller, and an OpenThread demo. Other demos include the World’s first Bluetooth 5.0 qualified, open source low energy Bluetooth Controller that features open source code from Application to Radio, a BlueZ Bluetooth Host stack, a Zephyr kernel, low energy link layer, OS Host Controller Interface, the Nordic Semiconductor nRF52, and the Arm Cortex M4F + Bluetooth 5 and Radio SoC. This demo will take a closer look at the different layers that make up a full BLE protocol stack helps explain this capability. Bluetooth Mesh in action on BBC micro:bit boards available since Zephyr OS v1.9 showcases the many-to-many BLE communication, how every node can be a relay and the user interface. A functional Bluetooth Mesh Network with Lightweight Machine to Machine Device Management showcases the Cloud Device Management System using Linux-based IoT gateways and Zephyr-based IoT devices for real-world project prototypes and smart objects. A demonstration of OpenThread integration, benefits from the Zephyr infrastructure and how it works with Nordic nRF52840 and OpenThread 6loWPAN Thread Stack. The flow of IP traffic is handled seamlessly by both the Zephyr native IP stack and OpenThread: 802.15.4 traffic received by radio driver is forwarded to the OpenThread stack, where it is processed by the 802.15.4 MAC, 6loWPAN and IPv6 layers implemented in OpenThread.

ARM Innovation Ecosystem Accelerator (ARM Accelerator)

Posted by Charbax – October 12, 2017

ARM Innovation Ecosystem Accelerator (“ARM Accelerator”) is an international global startup accelerator recruitment network in Mainland China, UK, U.S, Israel, Canada, France, Hong Kong, and Taiwan area, helping startups accelerate development in areas such as VR/AR, Robotics/AI, Smart Car, Smart Healthcare, Smart Home, Smart City. ARM Accelerator is an innovation and acceleration platform featured among ARM's ecosystem. ARM Accelerator focuses on smart hardware and IoT ecosystem. The core advantage of ARM Accelerator is to create an one-stop platform for China and overseas startups and integrates the world-leading IC design companies and scarce, high-value labs to provide the customers all kinds of incubation and acceleration services, such as professional technology consulting, design service, and global promotion and investment matchmaking.

Open Source Foundries IoT Zephyr, Linux, IoT Gateways, Bluetooth Mesh microPlatforms demo

Posted by Charbax – October 10, 2017

Open Source Foundries is a spin off company off of Linaro, composed of a talented group of engineers to work more directly with companies, OEMs, ODMs, small, medium to large companies to bring new open source products and solutions more rapidly to the market. Leveraging all the work done by Linaro and speeding up the time to market, enable rapid product development, here demonstrating some of the open source IoT solutions provided based on Zephyr on ARM Cortex-M and Linux on ARM Cortex-A using the Linaro Technologies Division (LTD) microPlatforms system.

The lack of a secure IoT solution has the industry scrambling. The Open Source Foundries team believes that a world can exist in which all connected devices can be secured and updated in a timely fashion. In this demonstration shown at the Linaro Connect San Francisco 2017, the team showcases its secure end to end FOTA (firmware over the air) solution implementing the latest in connected technologies.

At Open Source Foundries, software is their passion, hacking hardware is their favorite past time, so they have created the OSLight project to convert off the shelf hardware into secure connected devices. They have inserted a Red Bear NRF52 BLE Nano 2 into these lamps, to allow them to communicate over BLE with various cloud services. In the first demo, they demonstrate creating a secure BLE mesh network with these lamps. They show the ability to securely pass messages through the mesh network to control the state of the LED lamp. The next demo shows a set of 96Boards Nitrogens sending temperature data to the SoftBank IoT Cloud with the ONEM2M protocol using 6lowpan over BLE. The third and final demo introduces a variant of the OSLight project, a fully 3D printed light bulb. Instead of a simple LED array it has a 12 LED WRGB NeoPixel which is powered by line voltage, stepped down to 5VDC.

For microcontrollers, they offer their Zephyr microplatform, an open source software reference based on Zephyr RTOS and MCUboot. This software stack implements secure boot, unified microkernel, and IP (TCP or UDP) using 6lowpan over BLE. At the protocol level they've embraced industry standards such as LWM2M/ONEM2M/HTTPS/MQTT to provide an array of options for their customers, whilst ensuring no vendor lock in. Open Source Foundries subscribers are offered continuous validated software updates throughout the life of their product for a fixed monthly subscription fee.

On the gateway, they offer their Linux microplatform, which is again, an open source reference based on the latest Linux kernel version, and a minimal Yocto based userspace with a container runtime (Docker). By isolated the OS from the containers, each can be updated independently while providing limitless potential for the applications it can run. For updates they again implement standards, and stay vendor neutral to allow their customers to choose the solution that is right for them. Continuous validated updates for the OS and containers are also offered for this platform for a reasonable fixed monthly fee.