Microchip RISC-V-based SoC FPGAs get production qualification

Microchip Technology Inc. has announced that the first RISC-V-based PolarFire SoC FPGAs have entered volume production, marking a milestone in the embedded processor market. The production qualification of the MPFS250T and the previously announced MPFS025T extends the PolarFire SoC portfolio of multi-core RISC-V SoC FPGAs with a smaller thermal footprint for low-power smart embedded vision applications as well as automotive, industrial automation, communications, defense, and IoT systems.

(Source: Microchip Technology)

The PolarFire SoC FPGAs include a combination of mid-range transceivers, logic, digital signal processing (DSP), and RAM resources and are suited for safety-critical applications thanks to  their immunity to single event upset (SEU) issues and single error correction double error detection (SECDED) for all memories.

Microchip said the SoC FPGAs enable “highly integrated designs that are two times more power efficient per watt than competitive devices.” With improved power and thermal efficiency, applications can eliminate the cost and design complexity of using active cooling, fans, or heat sinks, while providing higher integration and defense-grade security, added the company.

The PolarFire SoC FPGAs deliver new configurable processing with hardened real-time, Linux-capable RISC-V-based microprocessor subsystem on a fast FPGA fabric, said Microchip, which are backed by the company’s commitment to long-term availability. They also leverage custom capabilities enabled by the open-standard RISC-V ISA, delivering improved power efficiency, security, and reliability as compared to alternative processing options, added the company.

The devices also offer new capabilities such as the deterministic asymmetric multiprocessing (AMP) mode, which allows users to run a Linux OS while running a maximum-performance, real-time application. This translates into improved computational power efficiency and compute acceleration at the network edge for a variety of applications, including communications, defense, medical, and industrial automation.

PolarFire SoC FPGA block diagram. Click for a larger image. (Source: Microchip Technology)

The company also announced that its Mi-V ecosystem, which is equally important to RISC-V adoption, has enabled customers to streamline RISC-V adoption based on its PolarFire SoC FPGAs for more power efficient and less costly industrial, IoT, and other edge-compute products. The Mi-V ecosystem spans a variety of IP, hardware, operating systems, middleware, debuggers, compilers, and design services.

“It removes barriers to entry, enabling embedded engineers, software designers, and hardware developers to leverage the advantages of the RISC-V ISA and the PolarFire SoC FPGA’s combination of small form factors, thermal efficiency, and low power consumption,” said Microchip.

The MPFS250T and MPFS025T are available now in production volumes, supported by the Mi-V Partner Ecosystem and development tools including the Libero 2022.1 SoC Design Suite. Sixteen Mi-V partners will demonstrate their solutions for Microchip’s PolarFire SoC FPGA at the Mi-V Virtual Summit, July 20-21, 2022.