An IC that simplifies the development of innovative low-power Wi-Fi 6 IoT applications has been released and is expected to help developers create low-power applications.

Nordic Semiconductor (Country Manager for Korea Choi Soo-chul) announced on the 1st that it is launching the nRF7002 Development Kit (DK) along with the nRF7002™ Wi-Fi 6 companion IC.

This IC is the first product in Nordic’s Wi-Fi product family and is a low-power Wi-Fi 6 companion IC that provides seamless dual-band (2.4GHz and 5GHz) connectivity.

The nRF7002 IC can be used with Nordic’s award-winning multiprotocol System-on-Chip (SoC) series, the nRF52® and nRF53® series, and the cellular IoT (LTE-M/NB-IoT) System-in-Package (SiP) nRF9160™, as well as with host devices other than Nordic.

In addition, developers can easily start nRF7002-based IoT projects using DK.

Svein-Egil Nielsen, CTO of Nordic and Senior Vice President of R&D and Strategyelsen stated, “Nordic Semiconductor has once again demonstrated its leadership in low-power wireless technology with the nRF7002 Wi-Fi 6 companion IC,” adding, “Developers can realize new and innovative Wi-Fi 6-enabled products through this highly integrated and flexible solution.” "In addition, with the nRF7002 DK, the award-winning nRF Connect SDK, and Nordic's best-in-class technical support, it is easier to develop superior Wi-Fi products," they stated.

Meanwhile, the nRF7002 enables low-power and secure Wi-Fi-based IoT.

This dual-band IC complies with Station (STA), Soft Access Point (AP), and Wi-Fi Direct operations, and meets IEEE 802.11b, a, g, n (Wi-Fi 4), ac (Wi-Fi 5), and ax (Wi-Fi 6) standards.

In addition, this product offers excellent coexistence with Bluetooth LE, Thread, and Zigbee.

The nRF7002 supports TWT (Target Wake Time), a core power-saving feature of Wi-Fi 6, and interfaces with the host processor via SPI (Serial Peripheral Interface) or QSPI (Quad SPI).

This IC provides a single spatial stream, a channel bandwidth of 20 MHz, 64 QAM (MCS7), OFDMA, a PHY transmission rate of up to 86 Mbps, and BSS Coloring.

The nRF7002 is not only suitable for general IoT and matter applications, but when used with Nordic’s nRF9160 SiP and nRF Cloud Location Services, it is also highly suitable for implementing low-power SSID-based Wi-Fi location capabilities. SSID-based Wi-Fi location services can complement GNSS or cell-based location services by providing accurate location even in indoor and high-density Wi-Fi access point environments.

The nRF7002 was released along with the nRF7002 DK, a development kit for Wi-Fi 6 companion ICs.

This DK includes the nRF7002 IC and features the nRF5340 multiprotocol SoC as the host processor for the nRF7002.

The nRF5340 incorporates a 128MHz Arm Cortex-M33 application processor and a 64MHz high-efficiency network processor. This DK supports the development of Wi-Fi applications and enables the implementation of Wi-Fi 6 features such as OFDMA, beamforming, and TWT. Additionally, the DK includes an Arduino connector, two programmable buttons, a Wi-Fi dual-band antenna, a Bluetooth LE antenna, and a current measurement pin.

Along with this DK, the nRF Connect SDK—a scalable, integrated software development kit for implementing Nordic’s wireless device-based products—also supports this IC, making it simpler to develop nRF7002-based designs. Developers can use the nRF7002 IC, nRF7002 DK, and nRF Connect SDK to add Wi-Fi connectivity to products more quickly and easily, and to implement Wi-Fi network-based internet connectivity and communication with other devices. Example applications for the nRF7002 DK are included in the nRF Connect SDK.

The nRF7002 Companion IC and nRF7002 DK are currently being supplied through Nordic distribution partners.