Top five product stories for the week of Sept. 30

By Gina Roos, editor-in-chief

Small form factors continue to be a big challenge for product designers as highlighted by two hot products last week — dev kits that speed up the development of small form-factor microLED displays and a digital IR proximity sensing module for wireless earbuds. These two products also complement the designer’s quest to cut development time, which is likely the reason why an 8-pin STM32 microcontroller (MCU) for simplified embedded designs, and an industrial Ethernet MCU solution were of key interest to developers. Improving test efficiency is always a plus as highlighted by NI’s new software enhanced for its semiconductor test system. 

Here are the top five products for the week of September 30.

1. Dev kits speed up microLED display designs

Plessey offers a starter development kit, based on its GaN-on-Silicon technology, for small form-factor microLED designs.

2. STMicro launches 8-pin STM32 microcontrollers

The 8-pin STM32GO microcontrollers from STMicroelectronics leverages the performance and power efficiency of the 32-bit STM32 family in a small package for simple embedded designs.

3. Tiny digital IR proximity sensing module targets wireless earbuds

Ams claims the industry’s smallest digital IR proximity sensing module, which occupies only 1 mm3 of volume, making it suited for wireless stereo earbud products.

4. Industrial Ethernet MCUs cut development time in industrial networks

Renesas unveils the RX72M industrial Ethernet MCU solution that includes an evaluation board, operating system, middleware, and sample software, supporting about 70% of the protocols used in industrial network applications.

5. NI releases new software for semiconductor test system

The NI semiconductor test system software enhancements reduce production test costs, while improving test efficiency.