Renesas Electronics America Expands the Ecosystem for Its RL78 Microcontroller Family

SANTA CLARA, Calif., May 2, 2011-Renesas Electronics America Inc. announced today for its RL78 microcontroller family new compiler support from IAR Systems, real-time operating systems (RTOS) from Micrium and CMX Systems, and Wi-Fi® (802.11n) support from Redpine Signals, Inc.

"To support the market's needs for industry-standard development tools and middleware solutions, Renesas Electronics America has teamed up with select technology partners," said Ritesh Tyagi, director of microcontroller product marketing, Consumer & Industrial Business Unit, Renesas Electronics America. "The RL78 family's outstanding low-power characteristics and extensive line-up combined with a well-established ecosystem offer designers world-class solutions for 8- and 16-bit embedded systems."

IAR Systems' Embedded Workbench® provides a highly optimized C and C++ compiler for the RL78 MCU family and supports the E1 on-chip debugger and IECube in-circuit emulator tools, both from Renesas Electronics. Additionally, the Embedded Workbench comes bundled with C-SPY® real-time debugger, and the instruction simulator.

"We’re pleased in our partnership with Renesas Electronics by adding development tools support to the new RL78 series of MCU devices. Our industry-standard IAR Embedded Workbench will bring a complete ecosystem development environment for the RL78 MCUs, and we are able to provide Renesas Electronics customers with high-quality service and technical support," said Nadim Shehayed, U.S. general manager, IAR Systems. More information can be found at www.iar.com/ewrl78.

"Embedded designers can gain a competitive edge by using Micrium's feature rich, reliable, efficient, compact and scalable µC/OS-II and µC/OS-III kernels which have been ported to the RL78 family of processors", said Jean Labrosse, founder, president and CEO of Micrium. "Battery-operated, power-sensitive and environmentally conscious applications can further benefit from Micrium's µC/OS-II's and µC/OS-III's ability to easily enter the RL78 MCUs' SNOOZE and HALT modes when idling." More information about Micrium can be found at http://micrium.com/page/home. The RL78 MCU port can be found at http://micrium.com/page/downloads/ports/renesas/renesas_rl78_family.

CMX Systems, a well-known supplier of real-time operating systems, has ported its CMX-RTX operating system to Renesas Electronics' RL78 MCU family. "We are pleased to provide Renesas Electronics RL78 MCU customers access to our small-footprint, low-latency RTOS," said Chuck Behrmann, CEO of CMX Systems. "The CMX-RTX is a truly preemptive, multi-tasking RTOS offering one of the smallest footprints, fastest context switching times, and lowest interrupt latency times available." More information can be found at www.cmx.com

Renesas Electronics America and Redpine Signals have jointly developed 802.11a/b/g/n wireless-connectivity solutions to add low-power, single-stream 802.11n Wi-Fi capability to embedded systems that use Renesas Electronics' RL78 MCUs. "Redpine is pleased to extend its close collaboration with Renesas Electronics into offerings for the new RL78 MCU family", said Venkat Mattela, CEO of Redpine Signals. More information about Redpine Wi-Fi solutions can be found at http://www.redpinesignals.com.

About the Renesas Electronics RL78 Microcontroller Family

Renesas Electronics' RL78 microcontrollers are the first family of MCUs to be developed using an integrated platform following the merger (between NEC Electronics Corporation and Renesas Technology Corp.) and to employ the new 130nm process. The RL78 family of MCUs combines and extends technology from the earlier R8C and 78K 8-bit and 16-bit MCUs from the two merged companies, contributes to lower overall system power consumption, provides an extensive variety of different product versions, and helps developers reduce overall system costs.

Ranked #1 Supplier Worldwide for Microcontrollers

Renesas Electronics Corporation again has been ranked by Gartner as the number one MCU supplier worldwide based on revenues from shipments in 2010 for 8-, 16- and 32-bit microcontrollers in the March 2011 market share report*. More information about Renesas Electronics’ MCU offerings can be found at http://am.renesas.com/prod/mcumpu/.

About Renesas Electronics America Inc.

Renesas Electronics America Inc., headquartered in Santa Clara, California, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Renesas Electronics Corporation (TSE: 6723), the world's number one supplier of microcontrollers and a premier supplier of advanced semiconductor solutions including microcontrollers, SoC solutions, and a broad range of analog and power devices. In the Americas, Renesas Electronics America markets and sells industrial-type active-matrix LCD modules from NEC LCD Technologies, Ltd., a global leader in innovative display technologies. More information about the products offered by Renesas Electronics America can be found at www.renesas.com/.

IAR Embedded Workbench and IAR Systems are registered trademarks of IAR Systems AB. Wi-Fi is a registered trademark of the Wi-Fi Alliance. * Source: Gartner "Market Share: Semiconductor Devices, Worldwide, 2010" March 2011.

The content in the press release, including, but not limited to, product prices and specifications, is based on the information as of the date indicated on the document, but may be subject to change without prior notice.