STMicro expands family of Value Line microcontrollers

By Gina Roos, editor-in-chief  

STMicroelectronics has extended its STM32L0x0 Value Line microcontroller (MCU) with the launch of the STM32L0* series. The new MCUs combine ultra-low-power technology and efficient 32-bit performance with the Arm Cortex-M0+ core for designs with tight cost, size, or power constraints.

The STM32L0x0 MCUs with up to 128-Kbyte Flash memory, 20-KByte SRAM, and 512-Byte true embedded EEPROM on-chip reduce external component count, which saves board space and cuts BOM cost. This makes them well-suited for price-conscious and space-constrained consumer devices including fitness trackers, remotes, and computer or gaming accessories. They can also be used in a variety of other applications including personal medical devices, industrial sensors, and IoT devices such as building controls, weather stations, smart locks, smoke detectors, or fire alarms.

Aimed at meeting energy-management targets, the MCUs deliver power-saving features such as a low-power UART, low-power timer, 41-µA 10-ksample/s ADC, wake-up from power saving in as little as 5 µs, and 670-nA power-down current with RTC and RAM retention. End products gain by extending battery runtime, increasing wireless mobility, or longer battery lifetime.

The STM32L0x0 Value Line is comprised of six new parts, with a choice of 16 Kbytes, 64 Kbytes, or 128 Kbytes of Flash memory; 128-Byte, 256-Byte, or 512-Byte EEPROM; and various package options. The new devices are pin-compatible with the full STM32 family of more than 800 part numbers offering a variety of core performance and integrated features, enabling scalability and the ability to leverage existing investments in code, documentation, and tools.

ST also offers a development ecosystem. These include the Keil MDK-ARM professional IDE, which supports STM32L0x0 devices free of charge, and the new STM32CubeMX configuration-code generator release that will be available in November 2018. A compatible Nucleo-64 development board (NUCLEO-L010RB) with Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) library is available now.

Available in volume production, the STM32L0x0 Value Line microcontrollers are priced from $0.44 with 16 Kbytes of Flash memory and 128-Byte EEPROM in quantities of 10,000. Unit price starting at $0.32 is available for high-volume orders.