On March 14, 2023, the Embedded World 2023 exhibition in Nuremberg, Germany, commenced. The theme of EW23 is “embedded responsible sustainable,” where global exhibitors discussed the latest trends and technological innovations in embedded system development. GigaDevice showcased various market-leading MCU products, development ecosystems, and innovative solutions. GD32 is working hand in hand with global partners to continuously strengthen its efforts, providing high-quality and convenient localized support services through a global service network, assisting customers in achieving product iterations and sustainable business growth.
Swipe left and right to view GigaDevice’s exhibition hall at Embedded World 2023.
The GD32F470 Series High-Performance MCU was rated as a “Top Thing To See” at this conference and was recommended via email to over 20,000 embedded design engineers globally. Meanwhile, the GD32E230 series value MCU was successfully nominated for the “Best-in-Show” award.
Swipe left and right to view industry media and expert reports on GigaDevice.
Mr. Reuben Townsend, FAE Manager for GigaDevice’s European region, was interviewed on-site by EE Times Europe, a leading global media outlet in the electronics technology field, to introduce the product features and innovative solutions of several high-performance MCUs, including GD32E5, GD32H7, GD32W515, and GD32F470.
▲ Mr. Reuben Townsend being interviewed by EE Times Europe.
Breaking Traditional Product Boundaries
Enhanced processing capabilities to address core customer demands.
The flagship high-performance GD32H7 series MCU from GigaDevice will also be officially released soon. This exhibition marked the debut of the GD32H7 series official development kit.
▲ GD32H7xxI-EVAL Board
GD32H7 series provides 600MHz processing power with an Arm® Cortex®-M7 core, and is equipped with advanced DSP and FPU. It features Flash memory ranging from 1024KB to 3840KB and 1024KB SRAM, including 512KB of tightly coupled memory for optimal processing efficiency. The GD32H7 integrates an LCD display and a hardware graphics accelerator, significantly enhancing display quality while also adding data security encryption features. It is suitable for digital signal processing, motor control, power, energy storage systems, audio and voice recognition, as well as various innovative application scenarios such as edge computing and AI.
Refined Energy Management
Helping global customers embark on a sustainable future
In recent years, the new energy market has developed rapidly, and photovoltaic inverters combined with energy storage can effectively manage energy conversion, synergizing and integrating with traditional energy sources. “Photovoltaics + Energy Storage” has become one of the most popular energy development forms worldwide.
The GD32F4 series high-performance MCU, with its high clock frequency, large storage, high-precision timers, and high-speed ADC, has extensive applications in core systems such as photovoltaic inverters, energy storage, and battery management. Additionally, the advanced peripheral interfaces, LCD display controller, and graphics accelerator of the GD32F4 support communication monitoring and human-machine interaction functions within new energy systems, helping equipment manufacturers quickly realize smart cloud connectivity for energy storage devices and seize market opportunities.
▲ Energy storage system BMS and communication monitoring module using GD32F4.
Switching power supplies are a type of voltage-regulated power supply that uses high-frequency switching regulators to convert and adjust the output, providing stable DC output. Compared to traditional power supplies, digital power supplies have advantages such as high efficiency, low heat generation, and high power density.
At this exhibition, GD32 showcased two digital power supply solutions. The newly launched 500W digital power supply solution uses a bridge PFC + half-bridge LLC topology: the PFC part is controlled by GD32E230C, with an input of 220V AC and an output of 415V DC; the LLC part is controlled by GD32E503R, with an input of 415V DC and an output of 24V DC, using SHRTIMER to control the frequency variation of the LLC MOSFETs for higher control precision, achieving a maximum overall efficiency of over 90%.
▲ GD32E230 + GD32E503 series PFC + LLC switching power supply solution.
The GD32E5 series high-performance MCU, equipped with an Arm® Cortex®-M33 core, features a hardware multiplier/divider and provides a complete DSP instruction set and single-precision floating-point unit, along with a hardware trigonometric function accelerator, enhancing computational power for digital signal processing and switching power supply control. It can replace traditional DSPs and run MPPT algorithms to achieve maximum power point tracking for photovoltaic modules, along with data acquisition, communication monitoring, and rapid shutdown functions.
▲ GD32E503 series switching power supply solution.
GD32E5 features a 90ps ultra-high precision timer (SHRTimer) and five independent counters, capable of generating five sets of two-channel complementary PWM control signals with dead time, which can interact with other peripherals to produce high-frequency waveforms needed for sine wave inversion.
Enhanced Graphics Processing Capabilities
Empowering a Cool Upgrade for Human-Machine Interaction Interfaces
Human-machine interface (HMI) technology is rapidly evolving, connecting PLCs, frequency converters, instruments, and other industrial control devices, as well as home control platforms through serial, Ethernet, and CAN communication interfaces, allowing users to interact with terminal devices and home appliances in a smarter, easier, and more intuitive way.
The performance of the processor largely determines the overall performance of the HMI. The GD32F4 series MCU, with its high performance, strong real-time capabilities, and large capacity, has been adopted by many industrial and high-end consumer clients with HMI needs.
LVGL is a lightweight, open-source, free embedded GUI design tool that, when paired with the GD32F470, can unleash unlimited potential. The demo showcased on-site features a 7-inch LCD display with a resolution of 1024*600 pixels, demonstrating built-in component functions such as buttons, labels, sliders, charts, keyboards, gauges, curves, and tables.
▲ GD32F470 LVGL GUI solution.
TARA Systems, a software tools and services company founded in 1990, is providing solutions for millions of embedded systems in the fields of consumer electronics, industrial applications, automotive, and mobile devices.
Embedded Wizard, a GUI technology under TARA Systems, can create high-performance graphical user interfaces even on resource-limited MCU platforms. It offers advantages such as code efficiency, rich functionality, scalability, and ease of development, effectively simplifying GUI development work on GD32 MCUs and accelerating product development and market launch.
▲ Embedded Wizard GUI solution.
As the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence applications experience exponential growth, emerging applications empowered by HMI technology supporting voice control, facial and gesture recognition ML algorithms are continuously emerging, enriching the intelligent control and interaction methods of IoT devices.
Supporting Multiple Mainstream Protocols
The communication connectivity capabilities of GD32 are highly regarded.
The GD32W515 series is GigaDevice’s first wireless Wi-Fi MCU, designed based on the Cortex-M33 core, providing enhanced computing power and rich integrated resources for the AIoT field.
GD32, in collaboration with Eutecus, launched the IoT Wi-Fi module X115Z-RA, which has achieved Arm platform security architecture PSA Level 1, PSA Functional API certification, Wi-Fi Alliance certification, and RF FCC/CE compliance certification. The module, equipped with rich MCU resources and basic peripherals, is fully compatible with GD32 MCU development environments and usage habits, allowing developers to easily build Wi-Fi connectivity solutions.
▲ GD32W515 series Wi-Fi module.
GigaDevice also provides users with a comprehensive hardware solution integrating brushless motors, stepper motors, and Wi-Fi communication, supporting voice control, smart networking, OTA upgrades, etc. This solution includes the GD32W515 series Wi-Fi MCU and the GD30DR8413 high-performance motor driver chip. Additionally, by connecting to a voice recognition chip via UART, this solution supports local voice wake-up and recognition functions, suitable for a wide range of application scenarios such as home appliances, central control panels, and gateways.
▲ GD32W515 fan control + local voice recognition solution.
GigaDevice combines the RISC-V core with mainstream wireless communication technologies and plans to launch Wi-Fi 6 + BLE 5.2 dual-mode wireless MCU products within the year, enhancing customers’ market competitiveness in wireless connectivity through leading RF performance and rich integrated resources. Meanwhile, GigaDevice is continuously building a rich and diverse wireless AIoT development and application ecosystem, providing various smart home connectivity solutions, including Matter, to help customers accelerate their product development cycles.
GD32 MCUs support mainstream RTOS and cloud connectivity protocols, such as Amazon AWS cloud service, Azure RTOS, FreeRTOS, RT-Thread, and Zephyr. All certified GD32 product models can be queried on the respective websites, and all codes can be downloaded for free from major open-source hosting sites.
▲ GD32E507 & Microsoft Azure operating system solution.
▲ GD32F470 & AWS operating system solution.
The GD32E230 paired with the GD30WS8805 power management chip for TWS wireless earphone charging case solutions has been adopted and shipped in bulk by several industry brand customers.
▲ GD32E230 series TWS wireless earphone charging case solution.
The GD32L233 series MCU adopts industry-leading ultra-low power technology and Arm® Cortex®-M23 core, paired with specially optimized low-power IP, featuring an extremely high GPIO multiplexing rate. Typical application scenarios include industrial metering, small consumer electronics, portable medical devices, battery management systems, data acquisition and transmission, etc. The logistics cold chain monitoring device designed based on GD32L233 achieves data acquisition from temperature sensors through a 12-bit high-resolution ADC, using embedded security IP TRNG and CAU for data encryption and decryption verification, and provides various power-saving modes to extend the battery life of portable devices.
▲ Logistics cold chain solution using GD32L233.
GigaDevice will continue to drive the iteration of low-power MCU products from multiple aspects, including process, core, product architecture, analog IP, wake-up mechanisms, and energy-saving modes, equipping various product positions with multiple packaging types, becoming a continuous driving force for energy applications and energy efficiency optimization.
Integrated Hardware and Software Solutions
Meeting Diverse Needs of Motor Control Applications
Motor control applications based on GD32 MCUs have already been commercialized in various terminals such as service robots, smart home appliances, refrigeration compressors, balance scooters, electric tools, and industrial servo motors, empowering innovation across many industries.
▲ GD32E507 series motor + touch screen drive solution.
▲ GD32F303 series motor + display drive solution.
▲ GD32E230 series vacuum cleaner motor solution.
▲ GD32VF103 series motor drive development platform.
GD32 products internally integrate independent multiplier/divider and other computational units, high-precision timers and hardware accelerators, supporting three-phase six-channel PWM waveforms, and also include rich analog peripherals such as high-performance ADCs, high-speed operational amplifiers, and comparators. Combined with the motor algorithms developed by the GD32 team, it can precisely control the magnitude and direction of the magnetic field for “pixel-level” control. While driving the motor, it can also drive the display to show the motor’s working status and operating parameters in real-time.
Continuously Optimizing User Experience
The Self-Evolving GD32 Ecosystem
The key reason GigaDevice is trusted by customers is that GD32 has created a development ecosystem that closely integrates products, users, and partners, allowing customers to choose tools that meet their needs, build solutions that better suit their development, and effectively reduce R&D costs while achieving self-controllable needs.
On one hand, GigaDevice continuously explores the potential of the GD32 series products, providing developers with hardware and software development kits and various self-developed solutions and algorithms. On the other hand, GD32 collaborates with global partner manufacturers to continuously offer users more integrated development environments (IDE), development kits (EVB), graphical user interfaces (GUI), security components, embedded AI, operating systems, and cloud connectivity solutions.
▲ Continuously strengthening cooperation with third-party ecosystem partners to support customer needs.
SEGGER, a well-known embedded tool manufacturer, has fully collaborated with GigaDevice. All SEGGER tools now support the entire series of GD32 MCU products, including Arm and RISC-V cores. For example, the Embedded Studio integrated development environment (IDE), the market-leading J-Link emulator, Ozone debugger, real-time operating system embOS, communication, data storage, compressed sensing, and IoT software libraries, as well as Flasher programmers.
Swedish software developer IAR Systems has released the latest version of IAR Embedded Workbench® for Arm 9.32.1, which fully supports GigaDevice’s GD32 series MCUs. Using the I-jet simulation debugging tool as a JTAG hardware debugging emulator, it can be connected via USB to a PC running Windows to develop GD32 series MCUs in real-time using IAR Embedded Workbench.
Belgian innovative microcontroller IDE supplier Embeetle has designed a brand new integrated development environment for embedded software development, providing users with a very intuitive experience. Currently, Embeetle also supports GigaDevice’s Arm and RISC-V core-based MCUs, bringing the unique Embeetle IDE to GD32 MCU users, balancing processing power between reducing power consumption and providing rich peripheral devices.
▲ ProMik’s MSP series network security programmer.
▲ P&E Micro Cyclone LC ARM programmer.
▲ μISP system-level programmer.
ProMik, a global leader in development and mass production tools, showcased a network security programming solution for GigaDevice’s GD32VF103 series MCUs. Through its MSP series programmers, ProMik can provide integrated debugging functions for GD32 MCUs, creating a secure production environment while being time and cost-efficient. Additionally, globally renowned development and mass production tool manufacturers such as P&E Micro and Algocraft also showcased efficient and secure debugging and downloading tools compatible with GD32 MCUs at the exhibition.
The famous inventor Franklin once said: “We enjoy the tremendous benefits brought by others’ inventions, and we must also be willing to serve others with our own inventions.” GigaDevice will further enrich the GD32 product matrix to meet differentiated market demands. At the same time, by strengthening self-developed solutions and investment in ecosystem cooperation, it will continue to add core value to GD32, providing products and services to more quality customers from around the world.
* All trademarks, logos, and brand names mentioned in this article are the property of their respective owners.
Further Reading
Review of Previous Periods
Expanding Global Ecosystem Layout, GigaDevice’s GD32 MCU Wins International Awards
GigaDevice’s Automotive-grade MCU’s Journey to Success
Riding the Wave of Photovoltaics and Energy Storage, See How GD32 Moves Forward with “Light”
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