Like it or not design methodologies evolve. Some into things we like more, others not so much. Renesas’ Synergy represents a re-invented development cycle, one morphed for the better, which allows designers to deliver their products to market first and thereby gain a significant advantage. The story of Synergy, very much simplified here to fit into this blog, goes something like this: As Renesas was contemplating how they would package MCU-based solutions going forward, they met with customers and it became evident that the software component was becoming the dominating requirement in MCU selection. Software developers were playing a larger role in defining the end solution and, with it, what type of MCU would best fit their system requirements What became clear was that it is a time-consuming and costly approach to use a standard MCU and then research, license, integrate, test, and maintain an RTOS, stacks, middleware, and libraries from multiple software vendors. So an interesting concept started to percolate: What if designers could get everything from one source – their MCU silicon vendor-- and in this way designers could spend their time focusing on application code—the really innovative aspect of their solution. What if the MCU supplier offered a synergistic platform that took care of the integration of new updates so developers could shrink that portion of their development cycle and spent more time innovating? And what if the MCU supplier offered and supported that software as a high quality commercial product and with APIs that would allow the developer to simply build his or her own applications on top of that software base? Ultimately, those questions led to the development of the Renesas Synergy platform, an integrated hardware and software solution optimized for embedded and IoT applications. The core of the qualified software components come in the Renesas Synergy Software Package (SSP). Provided with each Renesas Synergy MCU and included in the price of the MCU, the SSP supplies the key software components needed for all of the basic core system functions essential to the majority of embedded system and IoT applications. The features of the software are rich enough for developers to not have to create a platform by integrating a variety of software components sourced from different providers. Renesas engineers selected Express Logic’s ThreadX RTOS, as a basis for the SSP, added middleware components from Express Logic’s X-Ware, and integrated them with MCU device-specific Renesas software components including device drivers, middleware, libraries, and a flexible application framework with an API. All of the qualified and verified embedded software is tested to commercial standards and is compatible with Renesas Synergy MCUs. Sold, maintained, and directly supported by Renesas as a product, these qualified components are warranted by Renesas to operate as specified in a software datasheet. This aspect is a first in the MCU industry. No other MCU supplier provides a software datasheet or provides such software warranties. DevCon is providing a lot of ways—labs, lectures, panels—to bring you up to speed on Synergy. If you are looking for a starter session on what’s in the SSP, a good place to begin would be the introduction to the SSP session, designated 6L001A (Tuesday, 3:45 in Royal E and F). It is also being given as 6L100B (Wednesday 9:45, Harbor room).
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