Single IC for cellular IoT and DECT NR+ includes RF front-end

Called nRF9161, it is a globally pre-certified IC “that makes it possible to select either cellular IoT connectivity using the secure cellular infrastructure or use DECT NR+ to realise private 5G networking”, according to the company. “The product also boasts enhanced GNSS and cell-based location performance.”

The differences compared to its predecessor (nRF9160), include 1.9GHz DECT NR+ support and 3GPP release 14 LTE-M/NB-IoT support (700MHz – 2.2GHz LTE band).

On board is a 64 MHz Arm Cortex-M33 with 1Mbte flash and 256kbyte RAM. Security comes through Arm’s TrustZone and CryptoCell.

“Take advantage of power-saving features like eDRX, PSM, and AS-RAI, along with IPv4/IPv6 support up to the transport and security [TCP/TLS] level,” said Nordic. “Ensure your device stays up to date with secure firmware over-the-air updates.”

Packaging is a 10 x 16mm but, if this is too big, the 11x7mm nRF9131 was also announced, which is a “feature-compatible alternative to nRF9161”, said Nordic. “nRF9131 is prefect for DECT NR+ applications. It also supports cellular operations utilising the same LTE stack as nRF9161.”

That said, it is not feature-equivalent as the physical shrink comes from leaving out the power chip, which will need to be provided externally.

It also looses global certification.

Compared with the larger device, said the company: “it’s important to note that cellular end product certification NRE [non-recurring expenses] will increase depending on needed geographical coverage. This makes it a intriguing choice for global NR+ applications as well high-volume cellular products targeting specific regions.”

Neither nRF9161 or nRF9131 are in production yet, but they are sampling.

Development resources for both include nRF Connect SDK (software development kit), for which a which a Visual Studio Code development extension is available. There are also cellular IoT tools for optimising power consumption and network debugging.

On top of the new hardware, Nordc has added a cloud security service and cloud device management for secure remote provisioning, cryptographic identity authentication, device state monitoring and protocol-agnostic connectivity, it said.

The nRF9161 product page can be found here, but currently lacks much technical detail.