Renesas extends motor control embedded processing portfolio

2 mins read

Renesas Electronics has unveiled three new MCU groups targeting motor control applications.

Renesas is introducing over 35 new products, including devices from both the RX and RA families, adding to the company’s motor control portfolio, including multiple MCU and MPU families, analogue and power solutions, sensors, communications devices, and signal conditioners.

Renesas is introducing two new MCU groups from its RA Family of Arm Cortex-M devices. The RA4T1 Group delivers 100 MHz performance with up to 256KB of flash and 40KB SRAM. The new RA6T3 Group offers 200 MHz operating frequency and provides 256KB of flash and 40KB SRAM.

Both new groups offer an array of features and functions specifically for motor control applications, including trigonometric function units (TFUs) for acceleration, advanced ADC with integrated PGA, as well as a wide choice of communication interfaces including CAN FD.

The new parts are supported by the Renesas Flexible Software Package (FSP) for easy porting of designs from other RA family devices.

Renesas is also delivering new RX26T Group MCUs from the RX family operating at 120 MHz with up to 512KB of flash memory and 64KB SRAM. They support 5V power supplies, delivering high noise immunity and control accuracy. They also provide TFUs, on-chip timing, and interrupt control.

Customers of the RX24T MCUs will be able to easily scale designs to the new RX26T products to take advantage of existing design software while realizing performance and control efficiency improvements.

Renesas introduced MCUs designed specifically for motor control over 10 years ago and has now shipped over 1.1 billion motor control-specific embedded processors to thousands of customers worldwide.

“The industrial motor market is expected to grow strongly, as industrialisation and machine automation technology continue to advance in emerging nations. The market will also benefit from the industry-wide development of new manufacturing facilities in response to growing geopolitical risks,” said Takanobu Yamanishi, Senior Researcher at Fuji Keizai. “In particular, there is significant market potential in robotics, electronic component manufacturing equipment, and power tools, all of which extensively use MCUs.”

All of the new MCUs are supported by Renesas’ Flexible Motor Control development kit that enables easy evaluation of motor control using permanent magnet synchronous motors (brushless DC motors), and the Renesas Motor Workbench development tool.

Key Features of the RA4T1 Group MCUs

  • 100 MHz Arm Cortex-M33 CPU core with TrustZone
  • Integrated flash memory options from 128KB to 256KB and 40KB SRAM
  • Package options from 32- to 64-pin
  • Integrated Trigonometric Function Unit as hardware accelerator
  • Integrated advanced analogue functions including 12-bit ADC, Programmable gain amplifier, Comparator, and 12-bit DAC

Key Features of the RA6T3 Group MCUs

  • 200 MHz Arm Cortex-M33 CPU core with TrustZone
  • Integrated flash memory of 256KB and 40KB SRAM
  • Package options from 32- to 64-pin
  • Integrated advanced analogue functions including 12-bit ADC, Programmable gain amplifier, Comparator, and 12-bit DAC
  • Integrated communications options including USB 2.0 Full-Speed Device, CAN FD, I3C, SCI, and SPI

Key Features of the RX26T Group MCUs

  • Industry-leading real-time performance: 120 MHz with no-wait flash memory access
  • 5V power supply support: High noise immunity and dynamic range of analogue inputs
  • Dual motor support with FOC and PFC control on a single chip: 120 MHz PWM (2 channels of three-phase complementary + 2 channels of single-phase complementary), three 12-bit ADCs
  • Board miniaturization/BOM reduction: built-in high-speed on-chip oscillator, small QFN packages (48-HWQFN: 7x7mm, 64-HWQFN: 9x9mm)
  • Highly secure: dual-bank flash memory enables rewriting without halting the system; Trusted Secure IP-Lite reduces risk of information leakage
  • High-speed communication: next generation CAN FD and I3C basic support.