NXP Semiconductor announced that the second generation RF CMOS radar transceiver series has been put into production. TEF82xx is a new generation of TEF810x. TEF810x has been tested by the market, and its shipment has reached tens of millions of tablets. TEF82xx is optimized for fast chirp modulation and supports short, medium and long range radar applications, including cascaded high-resolution imaging radars. The device can support 360 degree sensing and key safety applications, including automatic emergency braking, adaptive cruise control, blind spot monitoring, transverse traffic warning and automatic parking.
In the ADAS function of classic passenger cars and the application of MaaS (mobile as a service), radar has gradually become the key sensing mode of safety use cases. In the process of realizing fully automatic driving, more demanding use cases require higher RF performance to "see" farther (beyond 300m), and achieve accurate detection, differentiation and classification of smaller objects with higher resolution from low to sub level. TEF82xx radar transceiver can meet the above requirements one by one. The combination of NXP's scalable S32R radar processor series and NXP's TEF82xx radar transceiver can provide high angle resolution, strong processing capability and wide sensing range, which are essential features of mass production imaging radar solutions.
The fully integrated RFCMOS chip contains 3 transmitters, 4 receivers, ADC converters, phase rotators and low phase noise VCO. NXP TEF82xx also integrates a functional safety monitor with MIPI-CSI2 and LVDS external interface functions, which conforms to ISO26262 and ASIL B standards.
TEF82xx, based on NXP's proven RFCMOS process nodes and production settings, has significantly improved on the previous generation. RF performance has been more than doubled, including+6 dB reduction in phase noise, 14 dBm output power at - 95 dBc/Hz phase noise, and 11.5 dB receiver noise figure. The TEF82xx uses an ultra compact eWLB package with exposed chips to achieve excellent heat transfer. Even if the ambient temperature rises, it can also meet the harsh thermal conditions in high-performance radar applications. The chirp return time is very short, only 4 µ s, which can shorten the working time, thus reducing the sensor power consumption, allowing more compact chirp placement, and enhancing the speed estimation capability.
By using the comprehensive radar algorithm library provided by the Automotive Radar Software Development Kit (RSDK), developers can easily build and optimize applications without spending time manually adjusting accelerator software. In addition, through the use of NXP's large ecosystem consisting of compilers, development environments, MCAL and free and commercial RTOS support, engineers can obtain the required resources to speed up development.
Steffen Spannagel, vice president and general manager of ADAS of NXP, said: "The application of high-performance imaging radar requires four cascaded NXP TEF82xx radar transceivers and high-performance S32R45 processors, which allow OEMs to achieve sensing at a distance of 300m or more with sub degree azimuth and elevation resolution. NXP has already entered the final radar module certification stage based on TEF82xx, and plans to start mass production (SOP) before the end of this year Several auto OEMs plan to launch corresponding models in 23/24. "
