With the need to support CASE, the requirements for automobile ECU design and development have changed significantly. In addition, to handle performance improvements such as emission regulations and fuel efficiency, it is also necessary to handle newly added functions such as autonomous driving and connected, and the number of development items is increasing more than before. How to complete development with limited development resources, budget and schedule is a common problem for automobile manufacturers and automobile parts manufacturers.
The winning combination is a solution that answers the above problems, supplements ECU development resources and supports the reduction of development period and cost.
In this blog, we will first explain the concept of Renesas automotive winning combinations, and then introduce some examples of those.
What is a “Winning Combination”?
The figure below shows the signal chain flowing from left to right. Renesas has had a strong presence in processors (MCUs and SoCs), but the coverage of analog products surrounding them has been limited until now. By reinforcing analog products with the acquisition of Intersil and IDT, it has become possible to cover a wide range of signal chains. By combining these analog products with MCUs or SoCs, we are now able to provide higher-added-value solutions. This is the winning combination. We have prepared reference designs and turnkey solutions that optimally combined the analog products with MCUs or SoCs. Winning combinations contribute to shortening your development period and time to market, and reducing development costs.
Renesas Automotive Winning Combination
Let us introduce some of the winning combinations we have developed so far by application. Please find the winning combinations you need now and use them to accelerate your development.
xEV & Electrification
The Automotive Battery Management System (BMS) reference design is equipped with an MCU and five-cell monitor ICs that can monitor and control up to 70 battery cells. The combination of RH850/P1M and the ISL78714 cell monitor IC supports functional safety ASIL-D as a system. Software such as GUI and low-level drivers are also available as an evaluation platform.
xEV Inverter Reference Solution can provide the inverter kit that covers not only semiconductor products such as MCUs, gate drivers and IGBTs, but also all parts required for high-voltage inverters for HEV and EV such as IGBT modules and current sensors. The kit includes motor control software and tools for motor parameters acquirement and for torque map creation to help customers easily start development.
Low Voltage Inverter for 2 Wheelers/3 Wheelers Traction Motor Control is a reference design for 48V motor control applications. In addition to the reference board and its hardware design files such as PCB schematics and layout data, reference software is also available to help implement motor control such as 120-degree trapezoidal control, field-oriented control and V/f control.
Connected & Infotainment
Low-Cost Digital Instrument Cluster can use the RH850/D1M and RAA27884x VSP LCD controller to generate 2D instrument cluster graphics that can be displayed on a variety of LDC panels with different resolutions. The reference design allows users to generate the cluster graphics in a single resolution and scale it with the RAA27884x's scaling engine to fit different LCD panels, thus minimizing the software and graphic design work for re-use in different car models.
Gateway & Domain Control
Domain Control Unit: The evolution of new E/E architecture is driving the trend toward a single ECU called the domain control unit that supports multiple ECU functions. To support its development, we have prepared a development platform equipped with our high-performance cross-domain RH850/U2A MCU. The reference boards with various physical networks and specialized power supply circuits for domain control, body, chassis and gateway applications, as well as the application software and drivers are available.
Chassis & Safety
Electric Power Steering System: The combination of high-end RH850/P1M and RH850/P1M-E MCUs for chassis applications and the RAA270005KFP power management IC specially designed for these MCUs support functional safety ASIL-D in the system and reduces external BOM costs. By using this proven combination, connection verification and evaluation can be simplified, and the lead time for system development can be shortened.
Additional winning combinations are continuously being prepared. For more information on our automotive winning combinations, please visit the Renesas Winning Combinations page.