Toshiba has announced it will begin sampling a new ARM-based application processor designed for wearable devices.
Dubbed the TZ1021MBG chip, it will form Tosh’s TZ1000 family of ApP Lite application processors for wearable devices such as smartwatches, smart glasses, activity monitors and smart bracelets. The new product will be on display during the four day Electronica 2014 show in Germany starting today.
The chip will be in mass production by March 2015.
The chip includes an integrated 48MHz ARM Cortex-M4F CPU with flash memory that is found in other chips in the ApP Lite product group, but it does not have Bluetooth Low Energy and the accelerometer that were integrated into the TZ1001MBG.
This makes the TZ1021MBG smaller and slimmer, according to Toshiba officials. The ARM Cortex-M4F CPU includes digital signal processing (DSP) and floating-point processing, enabling the combining of data from multiple sensors.
Toshiba officials said the chip includes highly sensitive analogue-to-digital converters (ADCs) that will help devices pick up and measure weak biomedical signals—such as a pulse or a heart’s electrical activity—and leverages a low-power design for devices that need long battery life.
The chip measures 6.7mm by 4mm by 1mm and includes 8MB of memory.
