Orca Semiconductor
Assembly Line
Customized Analog ASSPs for Smart Factories and Industry 4.0
A small to midsize factory may employ hundreds of IO-Link sensors and actuators for tasks like quality inspection, machine monitoring, and production line control. By comparison, a large-scale or highly automated facility may employ thousands of IO-Link sensors and actuators for applications spanning robotics, material handling, process monitoring, and energy management. Meanwhile, advanced use cases like semiconductor fabs or automotive plants may deploy tens of thousands of IO-Link sensors and actuators to ensure high-resolution, real-time data across a wide variety of equipment and systems.
Now, observe the green boxes representing the IO-Link Transceivers in the previous diagram. Prior to what I’m about to tell you, there were only three main solutions on the market: the MAX22515 from Analog Devices, the TIOL112 from Texas Instruments, and the RH4Z2501 from Renesas. All three of these devices have different sizes and form-factors, but that really is not an issue because the MAX22515 sells way more than all its competitors combined.
Think of the MAX22515 as having a target painted on its back. This is where Orca’s new OS2000 leaps onto the center stage with a fanfare of sarrusophones (once heard, never forgotten). This IO-Link transceiver for industrial applications can be used in either IO-Link Sensor/Actuator or IO-Link Master applications.
In addition to featuring two control interface options (I2C or GPIO), the OS2000 integrates many additional features that simplify designs, including two linear voltage regulators, one digital input channel, an internal clock generator, and integrated surge protection (for input power, CQ, and the digital input channel). The linear 5V voltage regulators may be bypassed if an external 5V source is available. The internal clock generator may be used to provide an IO-Link timing-compliant clock to the system microcontroller, thereby simplifying designs. The OS2000 also features five different output frequency options, thereby allowing it to work with most microcontrollers.
But wait, there’s more, because the OS2000 features robust protection to external conditions on external facing interface pins (VLP, CQ, DI and GND). These pins are reverse voltage protected, short-circuit protected, hot-plug protected, and feature integrated ±1.2kV/ 500Ω surge protection.