STMicroelectronics to Demonstrate its Automotive Technology at ITS 2009

At its booth, ST will feature a demonstration of the Navteq Map and Position Engine (MPE), which is based on ST’s GPS processing ICs, which won the Frost & Sullivan European Automotive Safety Systems Product Innovation of the Year Award 2009. The MPE provides a basis for enhanced vehicle safety through map-based driver assistance, such as advanced warning of road hazards or speed limits. ST will also highlight its involvement in security- and insurance-focused telematics projects with partners worldwide, such as Brazil’s mandatory tracking-based anti-theft system ‘Rasteador,’ developed in conjunction with Magnetti Marelli.

At the heart of ST’s solutions for driver assistance and telematics is a range of processors based on the industry-standard ARM7, ARM9 and ARM11 cores. Among these, ST’s Cartesio automotive navigation processor delivers performance and integration advantages for developers. The latest Cartesio IP introduces enhancements such as improved GPS sensitivity and advanced development tools. Visitors to the booth will be able to learn more about these processors, as well as ST’s standalone GPS receiver, Teseo.

In addition, ST will be demonstrating car-to-car communications using IEEE802.11p dedicated short-range communication technology, to show how tomorrow’s vehicles could exchange information autonomously to improve safety around hazards, such as approaches to road intersections or when overtaking. This demonstration, developed with Cohda Wireless, uses Cohda’s radio technology, as well as ST’s Cartesio navigation processor.

ST is also supporting projects with market-leading partners to create active safety systems based on machine vision and radar. A presentation with MobilEye, on the booth, will highlight the role of ST’s EyeQ2 processor in enabling advanced driver-assist features such as pedestrian protection that offer substantial improvements over first-generation collision-avoidance features and lane-departure warning systems. EyeQ2 is by far the most powerful processor dedicated to automotive vision, with multiple cores and seven dedicated vision-processing units enabling greatly increased performance for future active-safety capabilities. ST and MobilEye are working with multiple leading tier-one suppliers that are developing machine vision for world-leading vehicle brands.

ST will also be showing its latest automotive camera module for vision-based ADAS (Advanced Driver-Assistance Systems). ST is leveraging its camera technologies developed for mobile handsets to create tailored products for vision-based ADAS. The demonstration will highlight in-house production processes for CMOS cameras achieving the best sensitivity and dynamic range among devices currently on the market.

Other demonstrations will include ST’s solutions for radar-based ADAS, including 24/26GHz radar for short-range and side-mounted applications and 77GHz radar for long-range, forward-looking systems such as Active Cruise Control (ACC) and autonomous braking. ST offers a complete portfolio, including sensors, ASICs and processors, for this fast growing application.

In addition, visitors to the booth will be able to assess important new microcontrollers for safety-critical applications, developed in collaboration with Freescale Semiconductor and using the Power Architecture. These automotive-MCUs, which are designed for safety applications, contain ST’s leading-edge embedded Flash technology for non-volatile data storage.

A further presentation will highlight ST’s offering for hybrid and electric vehicle development, including IGBTs with high current density enabling cost-effective power handling for electric traction applications.