Software platform cuts MCU development cost

NEC Electronics Corp. has developed the SolutionGear-MINI software development platform, which aims to cut development costs for the company's V850E/ME2 32-bit RISC microcontroller.

The platform includes tools such as proprietary C-compiler and debugger, ?TRON RTOS, and middlewares such as TCP/IP, WEB server, PPP, DNS, and FTP server. This bundle is claimed by the company to represent cost savings by as much as 75 percent, compared to acquiring the components separately.

It also has a 237-by-107mm board, 32MB of SDRAM, and 1MB of Flash ROM. The SolutionGear-MINI also allows users to start development of internet and other applications prior to the completion of their target board design, as the evaluation board has Ethernet, USB, and Flash card interfaces with V850/ME2.

The SolutionGear.-MINI is sampling at about $2,076.