Toshiba ARM Cortex-M0 MCU optimized for smart meters

The folks at Toshiba America Electronic Components have announced a new 32-bit RISC microcontroller built around the ARM Cortex-M0 processor core.

The new TMPM061 is the first Toshiba Cortex-M0 device specifically designed for smart metering applications. The new microcontroller allows designers to replace the conventional two-chip analog front end (AFE) and processor approach to smart meter design with a single IC, delivering a savings in design footprint, component count and system cost.

"Thanks to their heightened accuracy for tracking power consumption, smart meters help to promote energy efficiency," said Andrew Burt, vice president, Analog and Imaging Business Unit, System LSI Group, Toshiba America Electronic Components, Inc.  "To enable our customers to get new smart meter designs to market more quickly and at lower price points, we've developed the TMPM061 microcontroller.  The device's high level of integration and support for features specifically designed to support smart meter applications make it a compelling choice."

ARM's smallest processor, the ARM Cortex-M0 delivers exceptionally small silicon area, low power and minimal code footprint, making it ideal for smart meter designs. Toshiba has used this core for its new microcontroller's main CPU, while deploying an onboard power calculation engine to simplify smart meter power measurement. The power calculation engine can calculate active energy, reactive energy and power factor as well as monitoring voltage and frequency fluctuation. The basic energy use calculation function can be updated and modified by the developer as necessary, enhancing design flexibility.

In addition to the power calculation engine, the TMPM061 offers a variety of on-board functions that minimize the component count of smart meter designs. These include a three-channel, high-precision 24-bit Delta-Sigma, analog-to-digital converter (ADC), a 10-bit ADC and a temperature-compensated real-time clock (RTC). The Delta-Sigma ADC supports simultaneous sampling at up to 6kHz and has a SINAD (signal-to-noise and distortion ratio) that is suitable for a residential meter.

Toshiba is providing the TMPM061 with up to 128Kbytes of on-chip Flash ROM and 8Kbytes of available on-chip RAM. Additional on-board peripherals include a 9-channel, 16-bit timer, a controller for directly driving an LCD display, a temperature sensor, a voltage detection circuit and a watchdog timer. Integrated connectivity comprises a 5-channel general-purpose serial interface (selectable between UART mode and synchronous mode) and a serial bus interface. The latter offers a choice of I2C bus mode or synchronous mode operation.

The TMPM061FWFG is supplied in a 14mm x 14mm 100-pin LQFP package and will operate with input voltages from 1.8V to 3.6V. Maximum operating frequency is 16MHz. Four standby modes (IDLE, SLOW, SLEEP, STOP) ensure minimum power consumption for a range of conditions.

Pricing and availability
Samples of the new microcontroller will be available from August 2012, with mass production scheduled for December 2012. Sample quantity pricing is $3.50 each.

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