Orca’s RF satellite chip includes a power management unit (PMU) based on Dolphin Design’s full suite of power management IPs tailored for ultra-low power applications such as Satellite IoT endpoint SoC and other power-sensitive SoC devices for direct-to-satellite and other industrial applications.

The race for satellite IoT connectivity for everything from shipping container and pallet tracking to livestock tracking and smart agriculture is starting to heat up, but it requires meeting challenges around performance, power consumption, price, and size.

Orca’s RF SoC integrates all required system functions, including RF transceiver, digital modem, CPUs, and power management, for satellite IoT connectivity in a small package that can operate with a couple of AA batteries for up to 10 years.

A key part of the ORC3990 RF SoC is the power management unit (PMU) subsystem provided by Dolphin Design. This includes all the analog blocks, such as a low-frequency crystal oscillator, a switching regulator, two linear regulators, an over-voltage protection module and, a combined power-on and power-off reset.

“We are very pleased to embed Dolphin Design’s IPs inside our SoC product family, including ORC3990, the world’s first fully integrated solution for direct-to-satellite IoT connectivity,” said John McDonough, CEO of Orca Systems. “Our company partners closely with Dolphin Design for the well-known ultra-low-power IPs needed for the satellite industry and our SoC. Their expertise in power management empowers our SoC with the best-in-class low-power performance and This is just the beginning of a great adventure together.”

“At Dolphin Design, our core expertise lies in power management and ultra-low power technologies,” said Hakim Jaafar VP of Marketing and Application. “We aim to provide the best solution to any energy-caring and challenging markets such as consumer and industrial IoT. The close and strong collaboration with ORCA was a mutual benefit for both companies leading to the success of Orca systems’ SoC products”.

Orca has patented digital radio and digital power amplifier (DPA) technology it calls Live Wireless RF digital radio that provides ultra-low power consumption to extend the battery life of IoT devices. Silicon-proven Orca Live Wireless RF digital transceivers are available to select customers as IP cores, known good die (KGD), and packaged integrated circuits.

SAN DIEGO, Calif., Mar. 8, 2023 – Satellite 2023 – Orca Systems, a fabless semiconductor company delivering groundbreaking digital RF technology, has introduced a highly integrated ASIC platform that significantly improves system performance and reduces power consumption for power-sensitive space, terrestrial, industrial and edge computing applications. Orca’s new ORC5000 ASIC platform has been applied to develop Orca’s first ASIC product, the ORC5990, designed for use in low-Earth orbit (LEO) IoT satellite payload and terrestrial IoT gateway designs. The company’s custom ASIC design, modem expertise and integration capabilities offer 10x performance enhancements over conventional FPGA-based system design with only a fraction of the power consumption. 

Orca Systems’ technology assets in the RF, analog, DSP and power management domains serve as building blocks and key elements of the ORC5000 ASIC platform. Orca’s innovative systems architecture and semiconductor design expertise have enabled the company to build custom ASIC and RF SoC solutions that precisely meet customer performance/power/area needs. This high level of specialization, spanning initial system architecture to final production, makes Orca Systems’ ORC5000 platform the clear choice when compared to conventional implementations using FPGA and other discrete components. Orca ASICs are extremely energy efficient by design, making them an optimal solution to meet the stringent energy budgets of power-sensitive applications. 

“Conventional implementations using discrete components or FPGAs are not optimized to meet the application-specific needs of today’s low-power system designs, resulting in higher power consumption and costly overhead and features,” said John McDonough, CEO of Orca Systems. “Orca Systems has the custom ASIC and RF SoC design expertise to address our customers’ performance, power and board area requirements and deliver solutions that significantly reduce total cost of ownership. Our design capabilities also include development and integration of complex RF, analog and digital IP from our partners and customers.”

The ORC5000 ASIC platform based on the GF 22FDX® platform has significant advantages for use in LEO satellite payloads due to its low power consumption and low susceptibility to latch-up and single event effects (SEE). The new platform also uses GF’s eMRAM technology in the application CPU subsystem, which enables low power and reduced soft-error rate and improves reliability for satellite communications.

About the ORC5000 ASIC Platform

The ORC5000 ASIC’s highly integrated design achieves significant improvements in power consumption for a wide range of applications. The ASIC platform is designed for highly complex, multi-channel modem and signal processor integration. It supports an internal PHY for access to large external LPDDR4x memory for samples or other large data set storage tasks. The LPDDR4x PHY with low-voltage operation enables low power consumption, which is critical for power-sensitive designs.  

The ASIC platform’s flexible serial peripheral interface (SPI) enables gigabit data throughput with an external microcontroller or external flash memory. The platform also supports mixed-signal integration including an analog PLL for generating high-speed clocks for the DDR PHY, high-speed digital circuits and other peripherals. Depending on the custom design requirements, power management circuits (e.g. DC-DC convertors and LDOs), memories (e.g. NVM and SRAM) and peripheral interfaces such as UART and USB can be integrated into the ORC5000 ASIC platform. 

The low-power ORC5000 ASIC platform supports an ambient industrial temperature range of -40 °C to +85 °C and enables exceptional system cost savings, efficient power system design, and reduced peripherical component count and PCB area. 

For more information, visit www.orcasystems.com. 

About Orca Systems

Orca Systems is a champion of always live wireless connectivity, delivering a groundbreaking low-power digital RF transceiver portfolio for the exploding IoT semiconductor market. Patented Orca Live Wireless RF™ digital radio and digital power amplifier (DPA) technology provide ultra-low power consumption to extend the battery life of IoT devices. Silicon-proven Orca Live Wireless RF™ digital transceivers are available to select customers as IP cores, known good die (KGD), and packaged integrated circuits. IP cores are optimized for integration into SoC devices for the lowest cost, smallest silicon area, and lowest power IoT SoC products. Orca Systems is headquartered in San Diego, California, with an exceptional research and development center and state-of-the-art lab facility in Bangalore, India.

SAN DIEGO, Calif., February 17, 2022 – Orca Systems, a fabless semiconductor company delivering groundbreaking digital RF technology, today announced its first wireless system-on-chip (SoC) solution for the satellite Internet of Things (IoT), the ORC3990. The company, which focuses on cost-effective, low-power wireless solutions for IoT applications, designed and developed the fully integrated ORC3990 SoC to meet the demands of satellite IoT connectivity. Orca Systems’ new SoC solution provides enabling RF technology for Totum, an innovator in IoT connectivity, enabling direct-to-satellite, indoor operation over Totum’s Low Earth Orbit (LEO) network.

Founded in 2004 as a digital RF intellectual property (IP) and semiconductor design engineering services provider, Orca Systems transitioned to a fabless semiconductor business model in 2018. This pivotal transition was enabled by Orca Systems’ development, refinement and integration of an extensive set of IP technologies critical to RF and digital communications applications. Orca Systems’ technology assets in the RF, analog, digital transceiver and power management domains served as SoC building blocks and key elements of the ORC3990 design. These core competencies, combined with Orca Systems’ innovative systems architecture and semiconductor design/integration expertise, has enabled the company to support partners like Totum with highly integrated digital RF solutions offering the highest performance, lowest total system cost and lowest power consumption.

“By rapidly delivering successful first silicon to meet our project deadlines, Orca Systems enabled Totum to quickly demonstrate communication from the ground with our SoC-based endpoint to our satellite network in record time,” said Ted Myers, CEO of Totum, “The ORC3990 SoC, with its high level of integration and low power requirements, enables the lowest cost bidirectional endpoints in the industry with a 10-year battery life. This is game-changing technology for satellite IoT connectivity.”

A Totum satellite technology based terrestrial endpoint for a LEO network using the ORC3990 SoC requires a minimal bill of materials (BOM). External components are reduced to a temperature-compensated crystal oscillator (TCXO), passive filters and switches, a PCB antenna and a battery. For simple, compact “tracker-on-a-chip” applications supporting global connectivity and positioning, a sub-$10 endpoint solution is possible based on the ORC3990 SoC – a cost point expected to drive high-volume demand.

“Orca’s unique architecture lends itself to integrating everything required in an IoT-focused SoC application,” said John McDonough, CEO of Orca Systems. “Manufacturing the ORC3990 SoC with GlobalFoundries’ 22FDX 22nm FD-SOI technology assured a cost-effective, low-power SoC solution that will be highly competitive in today’s market. Our innovative approach to IC design leverages extensive reuse of our SoC architecture, circuitry and methodologies, enabling us to achieve first-time-right silicon in one year of design for our partner Totum.”

ORC3990 Details – World’s First Fully Integrated SoC Solution for Direct-to-Satellite IoT Connectivity

The ORC3990 SoC integrates all required system functions into a single, cost-effective device in a very small 68-QFN package. An essential building block of the SoC design includes Orca Systems’ flexible, third-generation Live Wireless™ RF and digital radio subsystem, which has been customized to support the requirements of Totum’s LEO satellite network. Additional function blocks integrated within the ORC3390 SoC include a low noise amplifier (LNA), a digital power amplifier (PA), the Totum satellite modem, power management unit (PMU) subsystem including all analog blocks, dual Arm Cortex-M0+ CPUs for separate network and application processing, all necessary memory (volatile and non-volatile) for the on-chip CPUs, required security functions, and key analog and digital peripherals.

On-chip sensors provide temperature of an ORC3990-based IoT endpoint. The device supports a suite of digital and analog interfaces allowing it to seamlessly connect to sensors that detect temperature, humidity, shock, vibration and flow.

Orca Systems is the exclusive provider and manufacturer of the ORC3990 SoC to Totum and its partners. To help accelerate development and time to market, Orca Systems and Totum provide comprehensive collateral including data sheets, application notes, evaluation/demonstration boards and software SDK.  For more information, visit www.orcasystems.com.

About Orca Systems

Orca Systems is a champion of always live wireless connectivity, delivering a groundbreaking low-power digital RF transceiver portfolio for the exploding IoT semiconductor market. Patented Orca Live Wireless RF™ digital radio and digital power amplifier (DPA) technology provides ultra-low power consumption to extend the battery life of IoT devices. Silicon-proven Orca Live Wireless RF™ digital transceivers are available to select customers as IP cores, known good die (KGD) and packaged integrated circuits. IP cores are optimized for integration into SoC devices for the lowest cost, smallest silicon area and lowest power IoT SoC products. Orca Systems is headquartered in San Diego, California, with an exceptional research and development center and state-of the art lab facility in Bangalore, India.

SAN DIEGO, Sept. 27, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — Totum, an innovator in satellite connectivity, today announced the successful indoor operation of their direct-to-satellite IoT connectivity solution. Based on Totum’s groundbreaking wireless technology, which provides unprecedented reach from space, the demonstration showcased bidirectional communication between a fully integrated system-on-a-chip (SoC) and Totum’s low-earth orbit (LEO) satellite.

(PRNewsfoto/Totum Labs)

The terrestrial endpoint was located in a San Diego office building, and in contrast to high-gain directional antennas typically required by satellite modems, the demonstration made use of a miniature omnidirectional antenna.

“In a word, we’re thrilled,” says Ted Myers, founder and CEO at Totum. “In 3 years, we’ve gone from the back of a napkin to demonstrating the world’s first direct-to-satellite communication system that works outdoors and indoors with a modem the size of a postage stamp.”

“This accomplishment sits entirely on the shoulders of the innovative and passionate efforts of Team Totum, our silicon partner Orca Systems, and space partner Loft Orbital,” adds Myers.

The Totum solution provides both connectivity and position fixes for low-powered IoT location tracking and monitoring systems which require battery life of up to 10 years. Totum uniquely unlocks innovative, high-volume applications for supply chain, logistics, agriculture, transportation, energy, and industrial markets which require global coverage and indoor reach, in total a $20B+ connectivity opportunity.

“We’ve effectively created a whole new category for IoT connectivity,” says Dave Gell, Chief Commercial Officer at Totum. “Combining the global coverage of satellite with an indoor reach comparable to cellular puts us in a unique position to solve some of the thorniest problems in IoT today.”

“Critically, we’re able to do this with a total cost of ownership (TCO) that beats cellular. Not surprisingly, the market is responding,” adds Gell. “We’ve built strong partnerships with OEMs, solution providers and value-added resellers who combined have placed advance orders for 2 million devices with service.”

About Totum

Totum enables global asset tracking and monitoring using its constellation of Low Earth Orbit (LEO) nanosatellites and optimized device silicon. A revolutionary wireless waveform provides worldwide coverage, indoor connectivity, and an embedded footprint the size of a postage stamp. Combining connectivity and positioning capabilities, a compact Totum-powered tracker or monitoring system delivers battery life greater than 10 years. Totum is based in San Diego, CA. For more information, please visit us at www.totum.global.