Maxim Integrated Products Inc. has introduced a line of metering system on chips (SoCs) targeted at next-generation energy meters.
The ZON family of SoCs gives engineers the ability to speed up development time while meeting global utility standards for electricity meters, Maxim said. The SoC family is comprised of two series of products: The M series of single phase metering chips and the P series of three phase metering chips. Both series have tailored options for the low-end, mid-range and high-end meters. Both series are based on a 32-bit compute engine that is separate from the electricity meter’s application microcontroller. Maxim said this reduces the workload of the system core while letting customers port their application code from device to device to facilitate high IP reuse.
Since electricity meter standard vary from country to country, utility companies have a different set of requirements for each customer in each region. Flexibility then is a key feature for any energy meter being ported to new designs especially when adding in different memory requirements and capacities in design. Maxim said the ZON SoCs allow engineers to use one platform using the same firmware to optimize features and accommodate these different customer needs.
“The world market for electricity meters remains one of rapid change as demand for more accurate metrology and flexible solutions expands from established regions to developing markets,” said Jacob Rodrigues Pereira, senior analyst of smart utility infrastructure at IHS Technology. “With the ZON family’s shared firmware and common core, Maxim has introduced a unique product line so meter manufacturers can focus on country requirements instead of how to implement the design.”
The first products in the ZON family are available now with more products planned to be introduced in the future, Maxim said. Pricing is available on request.
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