Maxim offers protection for low-voltage IoT applications

Helping designers to enhance system reliability in low-voltage IoT applications Maxim Integrated has unveiled the Essential Analog MAX16162 nanoPower supervisor with glitch-free power-up.

This supervisor IC is said to be the first in the industry to fully assert a system reset through the entire system power supply ramp, eliminating low-voltage glitches during power-up and delivering higher system reliability.

More IoT system designers are switching to microcontrollers with core voltages of 1V and below, and traditional supervisory ICs show unreliable outputs at these lower input voltages. This leaves systems vulnerable to faulty power-up, causing the MCU to wake up in an undefined state with incorrect I/O outputs, wrong data reads or other errors.

The MAX16162, part of Maxim Integrated’s Essential Analog family of robust protection ICs, has been designed to eliminate glitches until the input voltage achieves the appropriate voltage threshold. By eliminating glitches it is possible to improve the reliability not only of IoT systems, but also portable medical monitoring devices, wearables, base stations, programmable logic controllers and automation controls.

The MAX16162 draws only 825nA, so that it provides robust protection without exacting a toll on limited power budgets. With a package size of 1.06mm x 0.73mm, this Essential Analog supervisory IC is 23 percent smaller than other solutions that are currently on the market and will help developers to save board space.

“ICs operating under 1V offer tremendous advantages for power savings and IoT proliferation but come with unacceptable reliability risks when not designed properly,” said Elnaz Shayesteh, business manager for the Core Products Group at Maxim Integrated. “We developed the industry’s first low-voltage glitch-free supervisory IC so system developers may eliminate the errors observed during power-up.”