Altair Semiconductor Unveils Embedded Linux Software Development Kit

Altair Semiconductor has announced the general availability of an Embedded Linux Software Development Kit (SDK), named Open-Platform.

With an MMU, dedicated I/D caches, on-chip SRAM, low latency access to external DDR, DMA resources, Ethernet MAC controller, an AES security engine and USB 2.0, SDIO and memory-mapped parallel host interfaces, Altair's Open Platform architecture features a dedicated MIPS processor. Covering any LTE frequency band in the range between 700-2700MHz, the FourGee-3100/6200 chipset from Altair supports both FDD and TDD variants using single software.

“Altair is the first company to embed an application processor running Linux inside of an LTE modem chip, giving our customers the unique ability to use our chipset for any purpose they need without having the cost, size and power burden of an external host processor," said Eran Eshed, co-founder and vice president of marketing and business development at Altair. "Our current Open Platform customers gain a $5-7 Bill of Materials (BOM) advantage relative to alternative solutions, which is a very significant difference.”

Offering performance which significantly exceeds traditional communications DSP cores, yet consumes a fraction of the power, the chipset implements a high performance MIMO receiver and is based on a proprietary O²P Software Defined Radio (SDR) processor. The combined chipset offers terminal manufacturers a true global solution. Ranging from USB dongles to smartphones, Altair's chipsets can be found in approximately 30 end-user devices.

Recently, the company partnered with Rohde & Schwarz to introduce a production line tool that enables effective testing of LTE terminals built on Altair's FourGee chipsets. Officials said that this release comes in response to Altair's growing number of OEM and ODM customers currently transitioning into mass production. The development of this production tool indicates the maturity of the company’s LTE ecosystem and is the basis for introduction of numerous new LTE devices to the market.

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