Microchip Announces New Software Library to Easily Implement Low-power Touch Pads with Surface Gestures

Microchip Technology announced a new 2D Touch Surface library that enables designers to easily implement touch pads using the company’s 8-bit PIC and AVR microcontrollers (MCUs) and 32-bit SAM MCUs. Available free of charge with the purchase of any compatible MCU, the library provides a simplified, low-cost solution for embedded applications, making possible to add taps, swipes, pinch and zoom to headphones and other consumer electronics devices at no additional cost.

Designers of IoT sensors, smartwatches, all types of wearables, and other size-constrained devices can now increase battery life and functionality using the ultra-low power MAX32660 and MAX32652 microcontrollers from Maxim Integrated Products. These microcontrollers (MCUs) are based on the Arm Cortex-M4 with FPU processor and provide designers the means to develop advanced applications under restrictive power constraints.

Microchip unveiled its next-generation In-Circuit Debugger (ICD), in-circuit programming and debugging development tool. The new MPLAB ICD 4 features a faster processor and increased RAM, achieving up to twice the speed of the previous generation ICD. The new ICD 4 offers a wider voltage range of 1.20 to 5.5V and increased flexibility, supporting all PIC microcontrollers (MCUs) and dsPIC digital signal controllers via MPLAB X IDE.

XMOS announced that it has completed the acquisition of Setem Technologies, a pioneer on algorithms that enable separation of voice or conversation signals within a crowded audio environment to achieve optimized input into speech recognition systems. The two companies have been collaborating on next generation voice interfaces and decided upon the combination of the companies to create a leading vendor in the fast-growing application area.