2011 has been a hectic year so far for FRAM programs.
After achieving total revenue of $47.5 million for 2009, followed by total revenue of $70.2 million 2010, the first quarter of this year brought organizational changes to Ramtron as well as announcements of delays in IBM’s planned FRAM-foundry program. IBM’s program for a 0.18-micron process began in 2009 with the intention of joining TI and Fujitsu with FRAM foundry services for Ramtron, and production material was intended for 2010.
However the outlook for the technology has improved significantly in May with a major announcement from Texas Instruments. Based on material from the company’s 130-nm technology process, TI has announced the industry's first ultra-low-power FRAM 16-bit microcontrollers with the capability to write more than 100 times faster than Flash and EEPROM-based microcontrollers, while using as little as 250 times less power. Additionally, the on-chip FRAM memory allows data retention in all power modes, supports more than 100 trillion write cycles, and delivers a new dimension of flexibility by allowing developers to partition data and programming memory with changes in software. The FR57xx series eliminates existing power consumption and write endurance barriers, enabling more cost-efficient data logging, remote sensing and wireless update capabilities. The design also enables intelligent battery-less RF connectivity solutions, which have been the hallmark of FRAM’s low power characteristics. Ramtron’s MaxArias series of products also takes advantage of energy harvesting from RF energy. For more information on TI's new FR57xx microcontrollers with proven FRAM memory, follow this link.
TI maintains that its proprietary process technology, jointly developed with FRAM partner Ramtron, enables it to integrate its MCU with an FRAM option along with other analog options onto the same chip. The essence of TI’s new microcontroller lies in its “ultra-low power embedded memory,” according to Scott Roller, vice president of microcontroller products at TI, in an interview with EE Times. “If you can drive down the power consumption, new markets will be created. That’s been always our fundamental belief at TI.”
TI isn’t the only company to embed FRAM into microcontrollers. Fujitsu introduced a single-chip, 8-bit MCU featuring embedded FRAM in late 2010 which is intended for a variety of general-purpose applications, including consumer electronics products, healthcare and industrial systems.
We believe that this is once again demonstrates the growing acceptance of product differentiation based on a wider range of memory performance attributes, and we expect that the performance capabilities of MCUs will continue to be an important opportunity for new memory technologies.
Key words: FRAM, ferro-electric, Texas Instruments, TI, Ramtron, IBM, Fujitsu, MCU, memory technology
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