Oki Announces the World's First Complete, Easy to use ARM-Based ZigBee Developer's Kit

New Fully-Featured ZigBee Developers Kit from Oki and Partners Allows Designers Quick Evaluation and seamless movement to Product Development of Wireless Solutions

Sunnyvale, Calif. -- June 7, 2006 — Oki Semiconductor, a leading technology partner for the new era of digital communications and convergence, today announced the availability of a low-cost, full-featured development kit for its IEEE802.15.4 based ML7065 2.4GHz ZigBee compatible radio. The kit contains the Oki ML7065 radio and Oki’s ARM7TMDI-based 4060 Series Advantage Microcontroller. At a suggested resale price of $499, Oki's Zigbee Developers Kit (ZDK) is the most fully featured 'complete-in-one-box' ARM-based ZigBee evaluation solution in the industry. The ZDK enables product designers to easily integrate Oki's radio and 4060 Series MCU - The World's Smallest ARM - into their designs. Oki's ZDK provides designers with a complete and flexible 'plug and play' development environment that is easy to use. The ML67Q4061 MCU used in this development kit offers designers large on chip memories and fast processors speeds which make it uniquely positioned as an outstanding proof of concept, prototyping and development platform to shorten the time to market for their products.

Value-Added Customer Benefits and Features

Oki’s ZDK was designed with the developer in mind. The ZDK contains all the necessary elements to allow rapid proof of concept and prototype product development. The key hardware element of the ZDK is the ZigBee Network Evaluation/Demo (zNED) board, which features Oki’s ML7065 radio and ML67Q4061 ARM7 MCU. Also included in the kit is an Integration Associates USB radio dongle that combined with zNED enables developers to quickly show a working wireless demo, with any missing elements of the ZigBee network emulated by a Windows based PC. This combination provides a simple and stable starting point for the development of any ZigBee embedded networking application, and the fastest route to proof of concept demos to get management buyoff on the project. The ZDK can be easily configured as a coordinator, router or end device with the provided demonstration software. After initial experiments are complete, a more thorough evaluation is possible using the provided evaluation software which includes the evaluation run time libraries of the Oki ZigBee Stack for ARM and Segger embOS real time operating system as well as an evaluation copy of IAR development tools which is also included in the kit. A second USB dongle is also included, so that simultaneous monitoring of the network activity via an evaluation copy of the Daintree Networks Sensor Network Analyzer can be done while the PC continues to emulate missing elements of the ZigBee network. Additional zNED boards may be purchased separately. When evaluation and proof of concept work is completed, any or all of the demo version software products can be upgraded to full use versions without the need to modify application code developed during the evaluation phase, minimizing overall development cycle time.

"Daintree Networks appreciates the recognition of the value our analysis tools bring to OKI's ZigBee development environment” said Bill Wood, President of Daintree Networks, Inc. “Using Daintree’s highly intuitive visual analysis tools, ZDK users can explore this exciting new technology and get their development off to a rapid start, including opportunities to evaluate enhanced versions which may be purchased at a later time.

Oki's zNED board has been designed to meet a broad spectrum of evaluation scenarios. In addition to providing the basic radio link functionality zNED has been designed to sense motion in three dimensions, measure temperature, detect ambient light levels, and optionally measure relative humidity. ZNED provides three user definable momentary switches, three user definable display LEDs, an RS-232 port and for more sophisticated user interfaces, has an option for connecting a two line by sixteen character LCD display. Realizing that some functions of the developers system may require custom hardware a 16-pin expansion port with power, I2C, A/D and GPIO has been provided to interface with developer built peripheral boards. To support application program development zNED has incorporated a full JTAG interface to the MCU. zNED also includes three options for powering the board; AC mains power (via a user provided power supply), battery power, or power from USB via the JLINK JTAG host interface adapter provided in the kit. zNED makes use of a modular design concept to enhance flexibility and future proof the system, by partitioning the radio functionality to a pluggable radio board. This modular radio concept will allow for various radio boards, enabling easy evaluation of various antenna choices and radio power transmission options without the need to purchase multiple zNED boards. It also allows for the radio board to be re-used with customers’ proof of concept or prototype systems removing the complexity of RF design from the product and allowing for a known good radio board to be used during the proof of concept and prototyping phases of product design. Additionally future radio boards from Oki may be used with the zNED board. zNED was also design to consider long life battery operation modes. To facilitate long life all sensors can be powered down by the MCU, the MCU has an internal real time clock for system wake up. You can even disable the power-on LED.

In review Oki’s ZDK includes the following hardware:

  • one Oki ZigBee Network Evaluation/Demo (zNED) board
  • two IEEE802.15.4 to USB radio dongles
  • one IAR JLINK JTAG debugger

and evaluation versions of the following software:

  • Oki’s ZigBee stack for Oki’s ARM7 based 4050/4060 series MCUs, developed jointly with IAI
  • Daintree’s Sensor Network Analyzer software
  • IAR's Embedded Workbench for ARM
  • Segger’s embOS RTOS

Taking a leadership position in providing full featured ZigBee development platforms, Oki continues to build on the success of its growing line of ARM-based Advantage Microcontrollers and related development solutions, by offering designers an industry-standard ARM MCU platform with strong industry support, including a constantly growing number of off-the-shelf software applications, and a wide variety of tools and software from third-party vendors. Oki's ZDK was developed as part of its partnership with Integration Associates Inc. to meet the needs of its designers who require an easy to use, low-cost 'plug and play' solution that will enable them to quickly evaluate Oki's ML7065 and 4050/4060 Advantage Microcontrollers for use in their designs.

ZDK Support and Development Tool

  • Oki's ZigBee Development Kit is compatible with Microsoft Windows and supported by the following industry-leading software development tools provided by IAR Systems:
  • IAR Embedded Workbench for ARM, which is a complete integrated development environment that offers designers the following benefits:
    • 30 day evaluation of IAR’s C/C++ complier, assembler, linker, code editor, JTAG debugger with target control, and Instruction Set Simulator (ISS);
    • The debugger offers extended target visibility allowing access to all of Oki’s 4050/4060 Series Advantage Microcontroller registers by name. In addition, the debugger has an integrated Flash loader, which enables programming of the internal Flash of Oki MCUs;
    • IAR Embedded Workbench for ARM is RTOS aware for popular RTOSes, such as Segger’s embOS.
  • Oki's In-System-Flash-Programmer (ISFP) is a Windows GUI-based utility that enables reprogramming of the on-chip Flash via one of its UARTs using the serial cable included with the kit.

"IAR Systems is excited about working with Oki to bring to market the industry's first ARM-based ZigBee development kit," said Andreas Lifvendahl, global account manager, IAR Systems. "To enable full development with tools from IAR Systems, an incremental upgrade path is available."

Customers moving forward with product development will need to purchase appropriate software licenses, such as an upgrade for IAR Embedded Workbench with its built-in C/C++ compiler and debugger tools. This enables seamless migration from evaluation to full product development with complete backward compatibility with any code already developed on the ZDK during the evaluation phase.

Product Availability

The ZDK, Oki part number OKI-ZDK-01, contains everything necessary for evaluation and development of a ARM based ZigBee solution and is available for a suggested manufactures retail price of $499. Additional zNED boards are available as an expansion kit, Oki part number OKI-zNED-01, for a suggested manufacturers retail price of $75, allowing customers to cost effectively purchase as few or as many nodes as required to build and evaluate networks that meet the needs of their applications. Oki's ZDK is available for pre-orders now through Nu Horizons for $499. To pre-order your ZDK please visit www.okisemi.com/us/zigbee.

About IAR Systems

IAR Systems is one of the world's leading providers of programming tools for embedded systems. Its business concept is to offer products and services that help customers reduce development time and accelerate time to market. IAR Systems' customers represent many different market segments such as telecommunications, industrial automation and the automotive industry.

The company was founded in 1983 and operates in the US, China, Japan, Brazil, Germany, the UK, Sweden and Denmark and has a large net of distributors all over the world. For additional information about IAR Systems, visit www.iar.com.

About Daintree Neworks

Daintree Networks is a leading provider of design verification and operational support tools for wireless sensor and control networks. Daintree's products are used by leading developer's of sensor networking-enabled products around the world. Our professional tools help OEMs, system integrators and installers of wireless sensor and control networks speed their time to market. Daintree Networks is a member of the ZigBee Alliance and playing an active role in bringing the first wave of interoperable standards-based products to market. Information on Daintree Networks and its products is available at www.daintree.net.

About Nu Horizons Electronics Corp.

Nu Horizons is a leading global distributor of advanced technology active components and system solutions, including analog, clock and timing devices, communications, computer products, discretes, flat panel display solutions, interface, logic, memory, microcontrollers and microprocessors, opto electronics and power, to a wide variety of commercial original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). With sales facilities in thirty-seven locations across North America and Asia, and logistics centers in centralized locations throughout the globe, Nu Horizons partners with a limited number of best-in-class suppliers to provide in-depth product and solutions expertise to its customers. Information on Nu Horizons and its services is available at www.nuhorizons.com.

About Oki Semiconductor

Building on Oki's century-long commitment to communications technologies and markets, Oki Semiconductor designs and markets a broad line of advanced integrated circuits for telecommunications, network, automotive, computer and consumer products. Oki's product lines include telecommunications, RF, laser, networking, speech synthesis, ASIC, microcontroller and memory devices, offered in a variety of creative packages. Founded in 1977 and headquartered in Sunnyvale, Calif., Oki Semiconductor is a division of Oki America Inc., which is a subsidiary of Oki Electric Industry Co, Ltd. Oki has ISO-9000-certified manufacturing facilities in Japan and Thailand. Information on Oki Semiconductor and its products is available at www.okisemi.com/us.

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