TI Korea (CEO Kent Jeon, www.ti.com/ww/kr ) March 5, 2012 – Imagine a device that can intuitively interact with the digital world without touch. Imagine a microcontroller-sized solar panel that can provide environmentally intelligent functions to any building. Imagine integrating carbon monoxide sensing, thermostat control, and biometric security features into a smoke detector without increasing its size. This smart, eco-friendly, battery-free world is rapidly becoming a reality thanks to TI’s world’s lowest-power microcontroller platform. With highly aggressive power-saving technology, the ultra-low-power MSP430 microcontroller platform, codenamed 'Wolverine,' reduces power consumption by more than 50% compared to other microcontrollers in the industry (360nA real-time clock mode, effective power consumption of less than 100uA/MHz). The first devices based on this platform will be the MSP430FR58xx microcontroller series, scheduled for release in June 2012.

Kevin Wang, a senior analyst at China's iSuppli, stated, "Everyday products such as blood glucose meters and fire alarms are expected to see performance improvements with battery lives of 10 to 20 years, and this trend is also appearing in other applications." He added, "TI's innovative 'Wolverine' low-power architecture is setting a new industry standard and will enable the proliferation of ultra-low-power products." "The scope is limitless, ranging from the consumer sector to the medical and industrial fields," he said.

"Wolverine": As a lowest-power microcontroller platform, no formulas or reasons are needed.
The "Wolverine" platform delivers the lowest power consumption performance for any use case compared to all other microcontrollers in the industry. Specifically, it supports the lowest active power, standby power, memory power, and peripheral power. For example, typical battery-powered applications achieve 99.9% standby time, and "Wolverine"-based microcontrollers consume 360nA in standby mode, extending battery life by more than double. Based on ultra-low-power system architectures and the innovative technologies of the "Wolverine" microcontroller platform, TI continues its achievements as a pioneer of modern low-power technology.

• Innovation based on unique Ultra Low Leakage (ULL) process technology: TI's ULL technology improves leakage current tenfold and provides optimized mixed-signal capabilities. The combination of enhanced 130nm process technology, the ultra-low power MSP430 architecture, and over 30 power-optimized analog and digital components results in several integrated devices that dramatically reduce power consumption.

• Superior performance and stability based on unified FRAM: "Wolverine"-based microcontrollers utilizing FRAM, the world's lowest-power memory, operate at less than 100uA/MHz in dynamic mode and reduce energy consumption per bit by 250-fold compared to Flash and EEPROM-based microcontrollers. In addition to these power advantages, since FRAM is 100% non-volatile memory, it provides developers with the low power, speed, and flexibility of SRAM and the key power-free storage capabilities of Flash. In addition, customers are not restricted by the specific program-to-data memory ratio that is unavoidable in existing embedded systems, and can change this ratio at any stage of the design cycle.

• Proven MSP430 Ultra-Low Power System Heritage, Peripherals, and Software Useful for Development: TI’s MSP430 platform has been leading the low-power sector in the industry for over a decade. This new ultra-low power architecture significantly reduces power consumption by utilizing a fast 6.5µs wake-up time, internal power management, and precision peripherals such as a 75µA, 12-bit analog-to-digital converter (ADC). All of TI’s MSP430 microcontrollers are also enhanced by the MSP430Ware™ software and resource package, as well as code optimization software for low power. MSP430Ware simplifies design and accelerates time-to-market by enabling developers to instantly access all MSP430 microcontroller design resources and simply filter them by device, tool, or software library.