Panasonic combines Bluetooth 5.0 and IEEE 802.15.4 in IoT module
Two integrated wireless communications modules from Panasonic Industry Europe deliver wireless performance at low power.
The PAN1762 series RF module is a Bluetooth 5.0 Low Energy RF module based on the Toshiba TC35680 single-chip controller. The Bluetooth 5.0 features enable a higher symbol rate of 2Mbits per second using the high-speed 2M PHY or a significantly longer range using the low energy coded PHY at 500kbits per second or 125kbits per second. A new channel selection algorithm improves the performance in environments which are busy at 2.4GHz. The Bluetooth low energy advertising extensions allow for much larger amounts of data to be broadcast in connectionless scenarios and are typically used for beacon and mesh applications.
Additionally, various sleep modes can be used to minimise power consumption and prolong battery life time. To provide maximum flexibility, the PAN1762 Series RF module can be operated in hosted as well as standalone mode. With the build-in 128kbyte flash memory where the Bluetooth stack is located in the ROM, the PAN1762 Series RF module can eliminate the need for an external processor, saving complexity, space, and cost. FCC, IC, and CE approval are in preparation.
The second module is the Panasonic’s PAN4620 dual-mode IoT module. This comprises NXP’s 2.4GHz 802.15.4 Kinetis KW41Z SoC and a Bluetooth low energy wireless radio microcontroller based on an Arm Cortex-M0+ core. The module can be operated in standalone and hosted mode. With 512kbyte flash memory and 128kbyte SRAM, the PAN4620 can be used as a standalone controller in very small and low power applications to eliminate the need for an external processor, saving complexity, space and cost. The integration of 802.15.4 and/or Bluetooth low energy connectivity into existing applications can be achieved when using the PAN4620 in hosted mode, explains Panasonic.
Using the PAN4620 with a TX power consumption of 6.8mA and an RX power consumption of 6.1mA in combination with NXP’s certified Thread or ZigBee stack, Bluetooth low energy stack or a combination of both for concurrent operation enables designers to deliver IoT application requirements without needing a gateway.
A range of evaluation kits is available for all wireless modules.
