Mouser Electronics announced a partnership with SEGGER to deliver embedded development tools to design engineers worldwide. With this agreement in place, design engineers will be connected to SEGGER’s highly integrated, cost-effective programming and development tools such as the Flasher (programmer) and the industry leading J-Link/J-Trace family of JTAG emulators. They feature high download-speed into RAM and flash memory and have the ability to set an unlimited number of breakpoints in flash memory through a hybrid FPGA-CPU emulation design. The SEGGER emulator and programmer families support ARM, PPC, ST, and Renesas processers. SEGGER is continuously adding support for additional devices.

“SEGGER offers best-in-class embedded solutions and we are very pleased to bring their products to our customers worldwide,” explains Russell Rasor, Mouser Vice President of Advanced Technologies. “This new partnership supports our business strategy of stocking the broadest selection of development tools to support the engineer’s design needs.”

“SEGGER cuts development time for new designs by offering affordable, high quality, flexible and easy-to-use development tools, allowing developers to focus on their applications,” says James Murphy, SEGGER Technical Sales Engineer. “Mouser shares these goals, and this new partnership will give our customers quick and easy access to our great line of products.”

With its broad product line and unsurpassed customer service, Mouser caters to design engineers and buyers by delivering What’s Next in advanced technologies. Mouser offers customers 19 global support locations and the latest, most technologically advanced components for their newest design projects. Mouser Electronics’ website is updated daily and searches more than 8 million products to locate over 2 million orderable part numbers available for easy online purchase. Mouser.com also houses an industry-first interactive catalog, data sheets, supplier-specific reference designs, application notes, technical design information, and engineering tools.

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Farnell has announced an exclusive agreement with Bourns to stock the company’s two RS-485 evaluation boards. Bourns, a leading manufacturer of a wide range of electronic devices including circuit protection components, sensors, potentiometers, switches and magnetic products, developed the two boards to provide customers using its TBU® High-Speed Protector (HSP), metal oxide varistor (MOV), gas discharge tube (GDT) and transient voltage suppression (TVS) products a fast and convenient way of evaluating circuit protection on RS-485 serial device port solutions. Bourns TBU® HSP solution offers enhanced performance features over competing technologies, which can help design engineers increase the surge and transient protection levels on RS-485 ports and place the entire circuit protection solution into a smaller PCB area.

In addition to offering the two evaluation boards, Farnell stocks almost 6,000 Bourns products. Engineers can also access comprehensive design support including application notes and collaborate with peers via the element14 Knode which provides a single interface to design engineering solutions.

RS-485 is one of the most common interface standards, and due to their prevalence in industrial settings, RS-485 systems must be capable of operating in very noisy and harsh electrical environments. In order to avoid damage and overload of the system, the use of robust and reliable circuit protection is required.

“Evaluation boards are an important part of what Farnell offers its customers to help them speed and simplify the development and implementation of new designs,” said: Mike Buffham, Director of Product, Asset & Supplier Management, Farnell Europe. “By offering the Bourns evaluation boards plus a comprehensive range of their products and the opportunity to design utilising our element14 knode platform, we are providing a one-stop location for engineers to successfully address circuit protection in their RS-485 port interface designs.”

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Electronic components distributor Digi-Key Corporation, recognized by design engineers as having the industry’s broadest selection of electronic components available for immediate shipment, and STMicroelectronics (NYSE: STM), a global semiconductor leader serving customers across the spectrum of electronics applications, have announced Team McGill as the winners of the iNEMO Design Contest.

Each project in the competition contained an iNEMO Inertial Measurement Unit and was judged on the number of degrees of freedom (DoF) used from the 10 degrees of freedom available in total, the quality of its hardware and firmware/software, the design’s novelty, its use of daughter boards, and the final project’s ease of use and appeal of its user interface.

ST’s iNEMO is a unique evaluation and development tool that offers 9-axis MEMS sensing of linear, angular, and magnetic motion, along with pressure and temperature sensing, managed by the STM32 32-bit microcontroller. iNEMO is in stock and available for purchase on Digi-Key’s US and Canadian websites.

Team McGill, a group of students from McGill University in Montreal, Canada, utilized the iNEMO evaluation board and 9 embedded degrees of freedom for their winning quad-copter design. The team met all of the competition requirements and their quad-copter design demonstrated the usefulness and enhancements that sensor technologies offer to electronic design.

Team McGill will receive a $5,000 cash prize and an all-expense-paid trip, including airfare and accommodations for three nights, to Europe to visit the ST iNEMO Development Labs in Catania, Sicily, Italy.

Coincidentally, a design team from Stanford University also designed a very competitive quad-copter that challenged Team McGill. For their second-place efforts, Team Stanford received a $2,500 cash prize.

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Service provides design engineers and enthusiasts with instant quotes on element14’s global community and quick delivery of manufactured boards

To further support the design process from concept to prototype, element14, the first collaborative engineering community and electronics store for design engineers and electronics enthusiasts, today announced a partnership with leading printed circuit board (PCB) manufacturer Pentalogix, to offer its PCB Fabrication Service on element14’s electronics community. This cost-effective service, available at www.element14.com/pcbservices further streamlines the design cycle for engineers and electronics enthusiasts, offering instant, customized quotes and fast, high-quality board delivery for prototype PCB implementation.

“The landscape of electronic design and production has changed dramatically over the past several years, with increased competition leading to shorter development schedules, forcing design teams to find ways to cut development time and costs,” said David Shen, Senior VP, Global Technical Marketing, Premier Farnell. “We are excited to partner with Pentalogix to provide design engineers and enthusiasts an integrated and streamlined process for PCB implementations.”

The Pentalogix PCB Fabrication Service delivers quick turnaround time on project deliverables, enabling engineers, buyers and hobbyists to upload their design files with a few simple clicks, instantly obtain online quotes for their prototype PCB implementation, and receive their boards in one to two days. In the past, fabrication quotes alone could take the same amount of time. Available globally, 24 hours per day, seven days a week, this unique service also allows for boards to be tested in advance at no extra cost, ensuring the highest quality and accuracy.

“element14 consistently demonstrates its commitment to supporting design engineers at every stage of development, and the Pentalogix service enhances that level of support to its global community,” said Agustin Araujo, President, Pentalogix. “The collaborative nature of element14 and its audience of professional design engineers, electronics buyers, and DIY hobbyists make it an ideal platform for the Pentalogix service, and that’s why we chose them to be our exclusive partner”

Pentalogix provides expertise in Computer Aided Manufacture (CAM) and Design for Manufacture (DFM), and strives to deliver continued evolution of technologically advanced and affordable solutions to PCB designers and manufacturers. One of the most unique features of the service offered through element14 is the use of the Pentalogix ViewMate with SmartDFM technology for processing board files, which allows for accurate PCBs. This service is also included in CadSofts’s award-winning EAGLE PCB design software, streamlining the entire process of building a PCB board.

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Electronic components distributor Digi-Key Corporation, recognized by design engineers as having the industry’s broadest selection of electronic components available for immediate shipment, today announced the addition of Silicon Engines to its listing of design firms on Digi-Key’s Design Services Providers online resource.

“By including Silicon Engines to our newly launched Design Services Providers resource, we are enabling a productive connection between engineers and experts in medical electronics, industrial controls, automotive electronics, and more,” said Mark Zack, Digi-Key’s vice president of semiconductor product.

“We’re really proud to join Digi-Key’s Design Service Providers network,” said Kerry Berland, president of Silicon Engines. “For many years we have been relying on Digi-Key as our primary source for electronic components for engineering projects. They greatly accelerate our design process—selecting alternative parts, avoiding components that will be difficult to procure in volume, and getting prototype parts over-night. By making it possible for us to compress engineering project timelines, Digi-Key is helping us save our customers many thousands of dollars in lost time. We hope our new role as a Design Services Provider will give us the opportunity to apply the skills we’ve developed for the benefit of Digi-Key customers.”

Silicon Engines specializes in embedded control applications, products in which a microcomputer and associated digital and analog circuitry yield an automated product solution. They design motor drivers, power supplies, keyboard and display interfaces, data communication interfaces, and RF circuitry. The company provides services in electronic design, schematic capture, PCB layout, prototype builds, and testing, and they manage production manufacturing. Their software engineers are familiar with the most popular processor families, including the ARM Cortex M3 and many others.

Digi-Key’s Design Services Providers Network offers fee-based high quality, efficient, system-level engineering and consulting services, including design feasibility, hardware/software electronic development, prototyping, PCB design, and manufacturing. Consulting services provided include ARM Cortex, FPGA, lighting, Wi-Fi, ZigBee, Linux, and DSP technologies. With expertise in a wide range of product applications and embedded systems, these design firms can help designs get to market faster, finish projects on time, and provide short-term assistance.

» Contact Details for Digi-Key Corporation

Electronic components distributor Digi-Key Corporation, recognized by design engineers as having the industry’s broadest selection of electronic components available for immediate shipment, today announced the addition of Design Services Providers to its online resources for electronic design engineers.

Design Services Providers is available on Digi-Key’s Website, www.digikey.com, and houses profiles of qualified design firms for the convenience of Digi-Key’s valued customers. Each design firm featured on this page is linked to a profile containing the firm’s capabilities, development tools, industries served, manufacturer partners, and background information. This information is available on Digi-Key’s homepage in the “Resources” box, on the Design Support Services page, or by visiting www.digikey.com/designservicesproviders.

“Design Services Providers is an extremely valuable addition to Digi-Key’s online resources,” said Mark Zack, vice president of semiconductor product. “We hope this network will be a tool that many customers utilize to shorten their time to market as it will link them to design firms with specific capabilities to aid in creating their latest innovations.”

The service providers in this network specialize in embedded, RF/Wireless and Lighting hardware and software design, including applications such as ARM Cortex, FPGA, Wi-Fi, and ZigBee.

Design Services Providers is designed to connect customers with the services required, and to educate them on how Digi-Key can provide help in the engineer’s development process from concept to production.

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World’s most powerful free-of-charge PCB design tool recognised by Printed Circuit Design & Fab magazine

RS Components (RS) the world’s largest high service distributor of electronics and maintenance products and the trading brand of Electrocomponents plc (LSE:ECM), has won the award for New Product Introduction of the Year in the PCB Design Tools category from leading industry magazine, Printed Circuit Design & Fab (PCD&F). DesignSpark PCB received the award based on meeting a number of criteria including creativity, innovation and user friendliness, as voted by an independent panel of practicing industry engineers. The decision was made based on meeting a number of the award criteria’s including creativity, innovation and user friendliness. The powerful, professional PCB design tool was introduced by RS in July 2010 and has since been downloaded from the company’s DesignSpark web site over 80,000 times. The award was presented to Martin Keenan, Technical Marketing Engineer by Mike Buetow, Editor-in-Chief of PCD&F and Circuits Assembly at a ceremony at the Apex Expo in Las Vegas, USA, on April 12th, 2011.

Completely free to download and use, DesignSpark PCB has no practical limits on pin counts, layers and output types for boards up to 1 square metre in size. Capable of supporting projects with complex, multipage schematics, it can be used for schematic capture, board layout and generating manufacturing files. The tool supports the import of Eagle design files and libraries and now comes with a stunning 3D viewer. It gives designers flexibility in their choice of board manufacturer with industry-standard, Gerber extended outputs.

Chris Page, Head of Electronics at RS Components commented, “DesignSpark PCB is one of the tools at the heart of the RS Components philosophy of making it quick and easy for engineers to find, buy and design with electronic components. Its global popularity is evident by the number of times it has been downloaded from our website and this award, run by one of the world’s leading authorities on PCB design, is testament to the work of the whole team here at RS. It demonstrates just how closely we understand what it takes to help electronics designers become more productive in their day-to-day work.”

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Mouser Electronics, Inc., regarded as a top global engineering design resource for semiconductors and electronic components, announces that its component database is available through EMA’s Component Information Portal™ (CIP) for design engineers using Cadence® OrCAD® Capture CIS. EMA Design Automation™ is one of the world’s largest electronic design automation value-added resellers.

EMA’s enhanced CIP provides direct download of Mouser part information onto the engineering desktop for fast, intuitive OrCAD schematic editing, as well as advanced features for management of projects, BOM, and component data. For more information, visit www.ema-eda.com/CIP or call 800-813-7494.

“Mouser Electronics is a popular component supplier among our OrCAD customers,” said Manny Marcano, president and CEO of EMA Design Automation. “Now they have a direct download capability available for Mouser component information and pricing, avoiding the problems typical when using manual methods to populate the engineering database.”

“Mouser prides itself on ensuring users have access to the newest parts and to the most complete, accurate, up-to-date data as soon as it is available,” said Kevin Hess, Mouser’s Vice President Technical Marketing. “Having this information within the engineer’s design environment gives EMA’s customers a time-to-market advantage along with the benefit of designing with the latest technologies.”

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Digi-Key Corporation, recognized by design engineers as having the industry’s broadest selection of electronic components available for immediate shipment, today announced it has stock of Cree-based printed circuit board (PCB) LED development kits, often referred to as star boards.

These kits, also known as star boards, are designed to simplify LED ease-of-use. PCB development kits, when combined with thermal heat sinks, can shorten time-to-market by forming the foundation for LED designs. PCB configurations are available for Cree XLamp XR-E, XR-C, XP-G, XP-E, XP-C, MX-6, and MC-E LEDs.

To search for these PCB development kits on Digi-Key’s website, enter the search term “digi-key cree” into Digi-Key’s part search bar and click on “LEDs – High Brightness Power Modules” under the “Optoelectronics” heading in the search results. From there, a filtered search may be performed for the particular PCB development kits needed.

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Global Technology Centre showcase their latest medical application, the Digital Stethoscope, available via element14.

In order to accelerate electronic design engineers’ design cycles and reduce time-to-market, Premier Farnell plc (LSE:pfl), the high service distributor, has today announced, that the technical team at its Global Technology Centre (GTC) has developed a comprehensive portfolio of vertical market development application notes for; alternative energy, automotive, communications, consumer electronics, LED lighting and robotics. The latest development is a series of medical-related applications that include medical instruments, diagnostic tools, imaging and portable devices, culminating with an innovative application note and development kit for a Digital Stethoscope, all available at element14, Premier Farnell’s leading industry-first online community for electronic design engineers.

The significant announcement comes at a time when the medical electronics market is estimated to be around $128.6 billion USD at a growth rate of 8% over the next 5 years resulting in market size of about $191.1 billion USD. In addition, the medical industry is the fastest growing segment in the industrial semiconductor market with an average growth rate of 10%, representing almost 10% of the $29.7 billion USD globally in the industrial semiconductor market.

“The implementation of these new development kits and niche application notes gives us additional resources and tools to help our customers create the best-in-class designs. It has never been easier to design and order the development kits engineers need to build a prototype with a single click.” said Edmund Lim, Technical Marketing Engineer at element14. “The knowledge of our technical team at the Global Technology Centre, when combined with our leading-edge transactional websites, offers customers a solution second to none for their purchasing and design needs.”

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