Atmel Corporation is a global leader in designing, manufacturing and marketing advanced semiconductors, including microcontroller, programmable logic, nonvolatile memory, secure, mixed signal and RF (Radio Frequency) integrated circuits. By combining these core technologies, Atmel meets the evolving and growing needs of today's electronic system design engineer through the production of general purpose and application specific system level integrated chips. Atmel's world class expertise and wealth of experience in system-level integration enable all of Atmel's products to be developed from their constituent blocks with minimum delay and risk.
Through its network of manufacturing, engineering, sales and distribution facilities in over 60 countries, Atmel is committed to a customer-oriented approach in serving today's electronics marketplace throughout North America, Europe and Asia. By ensuring the timely introduction and continued support of its customers' products, Atmel integrated circuits (ICs) are the very heart of the latest electronic products that help you (the end user) accomplish more at work, enjoy greater convenience at home and keep you connected wherever you go. Atmel enables its customers to lead the markets they serve with electronic products that are smaller, less expensive and offer more features than ever before. Consequently, companies that drive global innovation choose Atmel for its high-performance products that accelerate time-to-market and differentiate their product offerings in traditional and emerging market applications.
Product Overview
Nonvolatile Memories
Atmel has been a pioneer of NVM (nonvolatile memory technology), memory chips that retain their content in the absence of power. This capability makes them particularly well suited to small portable and battery operated equipment because they do not require power-consuming rotating disc or CD ROM storage. The Company's extensive NVM range includes EEPROMs that can be updated one word at a time, making them ideal for data storage; and high-density Flash memories, which can be updated a block at a time, making them suited to storing programs or large data objects such as images. A product line that combines the advantages of Flash and EEPROM is the patented DataFlash® family that uses an on-chip RAM buffer to enable a large Flash memory to read and be updated one bit at a time via very few connection pins. Atmel also continues to manufacture EPROMs for legacy projects.
Microcontrollers
Atmel's industry-leading
AVR® advanced 8-bit RISC microcontroller family provides instruction and data throughputs many times those of traditional CISC architectures. AVR features extensive on-chip analog and digital peripherals together with in-system programmable EEPROM and Flash memories, greatly increasing flexibility, eliminating the bottleneck of external memory accesses, and providing increased program and data security. The series ranges from the tinyAVR™ (1K bytes of on-chip Flash) to the megaAVR™ (128K bytes of on-chip Flash).
For applications requiring superior processing capability while keeping power consumption to a minimum, Atmel offers a wide range of 32-bit microcontrollers based on the ARM® advanced RISC core. This series offers a variety of memory sizes and on-chip functionality in order to meet the precise requirements of many high-performance applications. End-applications requiring extremely high data bandwidth can be served by the 64-bit MIPS®-based series or the 128-bit mAgic VLIW (Very Long Instruction Word) signal processor core.
The comprehensive range of Atmel's microcontrollers based on the industry-standard 80C51architecture includes In-system Programmable Flash, OTP and ROM memory versions. The family also encompasses advanced on-chip peripherals such as CAN bus controller , USB controller, MP3 decoder or smart-card interface .
Programmable Logic and Programmable System Level Integration
Atmel's programmable logic product range extends from simple PLDs (Programmable Logic Devices) to high-density FPGAs (Field Programmable Gate Arrays). Using state-of-the art design tools, system designers can customize these logic blocks in order to perform the data processing operations required for their applications. A revolutionary product that combines the processing power of a microcontroller with the flexibility of an FPGA is the FPSLIC ™ (Field Programmable System Level Integrated Circuit) family. This integrates, on a single IC, an AVR core, peripherals and SRAM program memory, together with a large FPGA block.
ASICs
Atmel's customer specific ASIC product range encompasses Gate Arrays/Embedded Arrays, Cell-based ASICs (CBICs) and full-custom products. These are intended for medium- and high-volume products where the optimum performance is required at the lowest power consumption and unit cost.
Atmel's ASICs are SoC solutions, integrating microcontroller cores and peripherals, DSPs (Digital Signal Processors), memory blocks, standard interfaces (USB, Ethernet, PCI, Bluetooth™, CAN bus, etc.), application-specific logic, power management cells and analog functions into multi-million transistor ICs. Design time is significantly reduced by basing ASIC architectures on standard microcontrollers or ASSPs, and re-using their constituent IP blocks. Atmel is one of the few semiconductor manufacturers able to integrate high-performance, high-precision analog blocks (notably ADCs and DACs) into digital ASICs. In addition, a range of
radiation-tolerant ASICs is available for space applications.
Secure ICs Atmel's industry-leading secure ICs for Smart Cards and embedded security applications combine a tamper resistant 8- or 32-bit microcontroller core with Flash memory or ROM on a single die. Flash gives the benefits of flexibility and rapid time-to-market while ROM gives minimum unit cost for stable products. These products have some of the highest security certifications in the industry, including ITSEC E3, Common Criteria EAL4+ and Level 3 approval from Visa® International. The biometric sensor product line is spearheaded by the industry-leading
FingerChip™ dynamic fingerprint sensor. Ideally suited for today's access and security applications, Atmel's patented sweeping biometric sensor has particular focus on space-constrained mobile and low-power commercial and consumer end products.
ASSPs
A key focus of Atmel's ASSPs (application-specific standard products) is multimedia and communications. This extensive product range includes wireless and wireline networking products, audio, video and digital still camera processors, digital TV decoders and a range of sound synthesis products marketed under the Dream™ logo. Associated products include ICs for VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol), a complete DVD control chipset, a GPS receiver and a family of broadband data conversion ICs. Other ASSPs are dedicated to USB (Universal Serial Bus) networks for advanced PC connectivity, power management, automotive and industrial control applications.
RF Products
The Company's RF products are complementary to many of its data processing devices. Now conforming to the 802.11 wireless LAN and Bluetooth™ standards, Atmel supplies both the RF front-end devices and single-chip controllers, which integrate ARM microcontroller onto Atmel silicon. A range of RF ICs for GSM , GPS , CDMA and DECT telephones complements the baseband processors for these protocols available or under development.
The rapidly-expanding market for security systems is addressed with a range of RFID (RF Identification) and access control ICs. The SmartRF product line of Micro Transmitters and Micro Transceivers focuses on low-cost, battery-operated wireless data communications applications. Automotive RF products include remote keyless entry and RF remote control devices.
Imaging ICs
Atmel's line-up of imaging and sensing products include CCD and CMOS image sensors and processors that cover market from entry level to the highest resolution required for professional, medical and military applications. When it comes to satisfying customer requirements with more complex image processors and industrial grade image sensors, Atmel's extensive portfolio of ICs covers the very latest in innovative image processor technology, which can also be integrated into complete digital camera modules.
