FROM EDN EUROPE: Cut smart-card terminal complexity with SOC solution

Identifying the need for a single-chip, low-cost terminal chip for smart-card applications, TDK Semiconductor has introduced the 73S1121F (Picture). With it, you can build systems that can directly connect to embedded-computer or PC hosts or that you can use in portable-card-reader applications. Using an 8052 processor core, the chip has a USB interface, two smart-card interfaces with a hardware UART that meets ISO7816, 64 kbytes of flash memory and 4 kbytes of RAM, a keyboard interface for a PIN (personal-identification-number)-entry pad, plus further I/O channels that can support a display controller.

You can control the chip via a low-level API, and a high-level API provides you with the protocol layers for asynchronous cards and for the USB interface. The ISO card interfaces meet the EMV (Europay/Mastercard/Visa) requirements that are prevalent in the smart-card domain, and application support is available to take designs through EMV2000 Level 1 approval.

Although the chip targets low-cost, low-power handheld readers, it connects directly to a 32-bit host system. The chip will cost less than $9 in high volume. TDK plans further variants, including a cost-reduced version with a single-card interface and one without a USB port.

The company says it will offer a very-low-cost version with an I²C serial interface for designers who need only the card interface with the EMV-approval capability. Using its mixed-signal expertise, TDK can also integrate a low-dropout regulator onto some of the chip variants to further reduce the device count in final designs.

TDK Semiconductor, +44 20 8443 7061, www.tdksemiconductor.com.