GigaDevice today announced the launch of its first automotive-grade microcontroller based on the Cortex®-M33 core, officially entering the automotive-grade MCU market.
The new MCU adopts an advanced automotive-grade process platform, adhering to automotive-grade design concepts and production standards, meeting the high reliability and stability requirements for automotive applications. This product series offers balanced processing performance, rich peripheral interfaces, and enhanced safety levels, making it a mainstream development choice for various electrified automotive scenarios such as body control, automotive lighting, intelligent cockpits, advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), and motor power supplies. The GD32A503 product lineup provides four package types with ten model options, which have passed preliminary user validation and are now officially open for sample and development board applications.
▲ GD32A503 Series Cortex®-M33 Automotive-grade MCU
Automotive-grade Standards and Design Concepts
Achieving Reliable Products
The GD32A503 new product utilizes a 40nm automotive-grade process and high-speed embedded flash memory (eFlash) technology, and through DFM manufacturability design and high test vector coverage, achieves synergy between research and development and manufacturing to enhance yield and reliability, meeting the stringent demands of the automotive market.
The development of the GD32A503 is based on the AEC-Q100 Grade 1 reliability and safety standards for automotive electronics. Wafer, packaging testing, and production supply chain management have also been certified by the automotive industry quality management system IATF 16949:2016. Each process step incorporates a Zero Defect quality control philosophy, emphasizing preventive system control and process control to ensure product quality.
It is worth mentioning that the GD32A503 series MCUs are entirely designed using GigaDevice’s self-developed IP library, which includes various high-quality and highly reliable digital and analog IPs that have been validated through hundreds of millions of mature mass production tests. This not only enhances the stability and consistency of automotive-grade products but also ensures seamless compatibility with the entire GD32 family, reflecting the continuous leading innovation gene of GD32 products.
Mainstream Configuration and Excellent Features
Empowering Automotive Innovation
The GD32A503 series MCU is based on a 100MHz Cortex®-M33 core, equipped with 384KB Flash and 48KB SRAM, with an additional dedicated code space configurable as 64KB DFlash/4KB EEPROM. The chip operates on a wide voltage supply of 2.7-5.5V and has an operating temperature range of -40 to +125°C, with a lifespan of over 15 years.
To achieve diverse body control and interconnected applications, the GD32A503 integrates multiple communication interfaces to enhance connectivity, supporting up to 3 USARTs, 2 I2Cs, 2 SPIs, 1 I2S, and is also equipped with 2 CAN FDs and 3 LINs. Depending on development application needs, the newly added MFCOM component can be flexibly configured as USART/SPI/I2C/LIN interfaces, further enhancing the flexibility of solution design.
The chip is equipped with 1 general-purpose 16-bit timer, 2 basic timers, and 4 PWM advanced timers. The internal 12-bit ADC sampling rate can reach 1M SPS, and it also integrates high-precision analog peripherals such as fast comparators and DACs to support automotive motor control.
The GD32A503’s Flash/RAM supports ECC verification, data communication supports CRC verification, and it is equipped with high and low voltage monitoring (BOR/PDR), clock monitoring, and other functions to provide hardware assurance for the safe and stable operation of the system. With excellent electrostatic protection and anti-interference (ESD/EFT) capabilities, it meets the low failure rate and high reliability requirements essential for automotive electronics.
With numerous excellent features, the GD32A503 series MCU can be widely used in various automotive scenarios, such as window control, wipers, air conditioning, smart locks, electric seats, electric trunks, ambient lighting, dynamic taillights, and body control systems, automotive lighting systems, and motor power systems, as well as dashboard, in-car audio, entertainment systems, central navigation, and in-car wireless charging systems. Thanks to its outstanding safety monitoring mechanisms, the GD32A503 is also suitable for certain ADAS applications, such as surround view cameras and AVAS acoustic warning systems.
▲ GD32A503 Series MCU Product Lineup
GigaDevice’s Product Marketing Director Jin Guangyi stated: “The automotive industry is undergoing tremendous transformation and shows great growth potential, and the development of MCUs has become a key driving force for intelligent innovation in automotive electronics. The new GD32A503 series products pave the way for mainstream application needs in automotive electrification, aligning closely with the resource demands of complete vehicles. We will continue to deepen our automotive-grade product line layout, including upgraded products that meet ISO26262 functional safety standards ASIL-B/D levels, which are currently under development. We aim to provide products and solutions that meet automotive user needs and enhance industry influence in collaboration with our partners.”
Product-level Software and Solutions
Building the Automotive Ecosystem
The GD32A503 series products support the AUTOSAR® automotive open system architecture, enhancing the independence of software and hardware modules, making it easier to migrate between different designs. The newly developed product-level software package provides a microcontroller abstraction layer (MCAL) and internal drivers, allowing direct access to the MCU and peripheral chips, effectively simplifying the development process of automotive software upper applications, enhancing code universality and reusability, and reducing development costs and cycles.
The new MCU is compatible with various mainstream integrated development environments (IDEs) such as Keil MDK/IAR EWARM/SEGGER/GCC. The accompanying development boards include the GD32A503V-EVAL full-feature evaluation board and the GD32A503R-START, GD32A503C-START, GD32A503K-START entry-level learning kits, corresponding to various packages and pin configurations, facilitating user development and debugging.
Thanks to the rich and complete ecosystem of the GD32 family, development resources for the GD32A503 chip are also ready. Users can develop automotive-grade projects using existing GD32 debugging and mass production tools, technical documents, operating systems, and hardware/software platforms, continuously leveraging Arm technology advantages and promoting its adoption in automotive electronics.
GigaDevice is also collaborating with several Tier-1 and solution providers in the industry to continuously build an automotive-grade MCU ecosystem, providing users with differentiated application solutions for the automotive market, including reference designs for automotive instrument systems, monocular warning cameras, DC motor control, electric seat adjustments, cooling systems and radiators, automotive ambient light strips, and advanced external lighting for various automotive scenarios. Through the development toolchain construction and ecosystem deployment, we simplify and shorten the development cycle of terminal devices and accelerate the mass production process.
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