Freescale Enhances 16-Bit Microcontroller Lineup With Scalable, Cost-Effective Family.

Streamlined S12XS Family Complements High-Performance S12XE Family; Targets Automotive Body and Passenger Comfort Applications

PARIS -- Addressing customer needs for design flexibility and platform compatibility, Freescale Semiconductor (NYSE:FSL) (NYSE:FSL.B) has unveiled a 16-bit microcontroller (MCU) family optimized for a broad range of cost-sensitive automotive body electronics applications. The family includes six devices designed to give customers flexibility in choosing different memory, package and cost options to accommodate their application requirements.

The latest addition to the S12X portfolio, the S12XS family provides an economical, compatible extension to the recently announced high-performance S12XE family. It also broadens the overall S12X product offering and provides customers with lower cost and smaller package options. The S12XS and S12XE families have complementary memory, peripherals and packages. This flexibility can help designers react quickly to market opportunities and reduce the cost of migration if application requirements change during the development cycle. The full range of S12 and S12X products enables scalability, hardware and software reusability, and compatibility across a broad array of automotive electronics platforms.

The S12XS family features a streamlined set of on-chip peripheral, memory and package options optimized for automotive body and passenger comfort applications. Potential applications include seat controllers, heat ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) control modules, steering wheel controllers and sunroofs. The S12XS devices are also available in QFN packages as small as 7mm x 7mm - a reduced size for a 16-bit MCU. Compact packaging makes these devices suitable for space-constrained applications, such as small actuators, sensor modules and column-integrated modules.

"Automotive electronics customers continually look for ways to reduce development cost and time while maintaining software and hardware reusability across applications and platforms," said Mike McCourt, vice president and general manager of Freescale's microcontroller division. "With the introduction of the S12XS family, Freescale now offers a full range of compatible, 16-bit price/performance options, giving customers greater flexibility in their body electronics designs."

Freescale offers a broad range of price, performance, peripheral and package options within each of its MCU families and provides automotive customers with choices that span 8-, 16- and 32-bit architectures. Within each product family and architecture, customers can choose the optimal device at the right price point for their application needs and easily migrate to higher performance and more advanced functionality. They also can leverage common sets of hardware and software tools, which can help reduce development cost and speed time to market.

Freescale's S12 MCU family is the most widely adopted 16-bit architecture in the automotive market. S12-based devices are now shipping at a rate of more than 100 million units per year. The scalable S12 family offers developers a range of choices for their application needs, with on-chip flash scaling from 32KB to 1MB and a smooth migration path to higher performance S12X devices.

MC9S12XS Family Features

The MC9S12XS family provides a cost-effective complement to the high-performance S12XE MCU family. Key features include:

* 32MHz core and bus speed

* 64KB, 128KB and 256KB flash memory options, all with error correction code (ECC)

* 4KB to 8KB DataFlash with ECC, used for data or program storage

* Choice of configurable 8-,10- or 12-bit analog-to-digital converter (ADC), capable of 3[acute accent]s conversion time

* Support for control area network (CAN), local interconnect network (LIN) and serial peripheral interface (SPI) protocols

* 8-channel timer with 16-bit counters

* Excellent EMC / run & stop current performance

* Broad package options for small footprint requirements:

        --  48QFN, 7mm x 7mm x 1mm, 0.5mm pitch
        --  64LQFP, 10mm x 10mm x 1.4mm, 0.5mm pitch
        --  80QFP, 14mm x14mm x 2.2mm, 0.65mm pitch
        --  112 LQFP 20mm x 20mm x 1.4mm, 0.65mm pitch

* Extensive tools support from S12X family

MC9S12XS Family Availability

Freescale plans to offer samples of MC9S12XS family devices in Q1 2007. Evaluation boards, software and documentation are available now. For more product information, visit http://www.freescale.com/files/pr/s12xs.html.

About Freescale Semiconductor

Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. (NYSE:FSL) (NYSE:FSL.B) is a global leader in the design and manufacture of embedded semiconductors for the automotive, consumer, industrial, networking and wireless markets. Freescale became a publicly traded company in July 2004. The company is based in Austin, Texas, and has design, research and development, manufacturing or sales operations in more than 30 countries. Freescale, a member of the S&P 500[R], is one of the world's largest semiconductor companies with 2005 sales of $5.8 billion (USD). www.freescale.com.

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