A new era of UWB technology application has opened, and Chixin UWB SoC chip helps unlock greater potential

On September 26-27, 2023, the "2023 Automotive Semiconductor Ecological Summit and Global Automotive Electronics Expo" was held in Shenzhen Futian Convention and Exhibition Center. The theme of this conference is "Chain Core, Cheng Zhi, Build the Future", guided by Guangdong Provincial Department of Industry and Information Technology, Shenzhen Municipal Bureau of Industry and Information Technology and China Energy Vehicle Communication Group, hosted by China Automotive News and hosted by Aijiwei.

In the perception special session of "2023 Automotive Semiconductor Ecological Summit and Global Automotive Electronics Expo" held on September 26, Li Yu, Director of the Solution Department of Changsha Chixin Semiconductor Technology Co., LTD., gave a keynote speech on "Ultra-broadband Perception to Help the New Era of Automotive Intelligence". The achievements of Chixin in the field of UWB technology and the reflection and exploration on the wider application of UWB were shared.

Changsha Chixin Semiconductor Technology Co., LTD. Solutions Department Director Li Yu

The era of the use of UWB technology at the end of the car has opened, and the Chixin semiconductor SoC chip provides a richer imagination for interaction

The third version of the agreement of CCC (Vehicle and Machine Interconnection Alliance) in July 2021 identified UWB as the third-generation smart key core technology, and the standard standardized the physical layer, MAC layer and security protocol of UWB, which clarified that the third-generation smart car key is a UWB+BLE+NFC integration system.

Li Yu introduced that Chixin Semiconductor was founded in June 2020, headquartered in Xincheng Science Park, Xiangjiang New District, Changsha, Hunan, and has a subsidiary in Shanghai. The company focuses on the research and development and sales of Ultra Wide Band (UWB) chips. The company focuses on the design and sales of UWB chips. The CX310 series UWB SoC chip has been certified by FiRa Alliance and can interwork with a variety of commercial terminals.

The core members of Chixin Semiconductor come from domestic and foreign first-line semiconductor design enterprises, and all have more than 10 years of experience, is a team with rich experience in communication chip design and combat effectiveness. The company's core technologies are independently developed, including analog, radio frequency, baseband, algorithm, protocol stack software, application software and hardware solutions, to provide customers with turnkey solutions and services.

At present, Chixin Semiconductor has completed the research and development of UWB core technologies (high-speed pulse communication technology, ultra-low power technology, security technology, precision positioning algorithm, high-resolution radar algorithm, etc.), CX310 and CX500 UWB chip products have been successfully developed, obtained more than 60 national patents, and Hunan Province science and technology enterprises, specialized new enterprises identified.

Li Yu pointed out that UWB has the characteristics of large bandwidth and low delay, the frame length is less than 1ms, and supports ultra-low delay communication, ranging, radar detection and so on. Secondly, UWB also has the characteristics of narrow pulse and high precision, the symbol width is 2ns, and with the high-precision ranging algorithm, it can obtain centimeter-level ranging and radar measurement. In addition, UWB has high security, anti-injection attacks and relay attacks, dynamic STS function can also combat key cracking.

UWB perception can be divided into active perception and passive perception. Active perception includes accurate ranging and accurate Angle measurement. Passive sensing includes single-station radar and multi-station radar.

Li Yu pointed out that from the system dimension, UWB digital key integrates UWB, BLE, NFC three wireless communication technologies. The main role of UWB in the scheme is to complete the ranging of the car end and the key end as well as the accurate position tracking of the key.

The two typical layouts at the car end of UWB digital key adopt 5 anchor points and 4 anchor points respectively. In the actual scheme selection, the scheme to be used can be selected according to different models and the expected effect of key perception.

Li Yu said that in view of the excellent active perception ability of UWB, the key is realized without influence, and at the same time, it provides a richer imagination space for vehicle and machine interaction.

"Ambitious" UWB to unlock more future applications

Li Yu pointed out that in addition to the smart CAR key function, UWB can also be used as a new generation of CAR ID. If the car is regarded as an intelligent terminal, the current way of "identity authentication" of the car mainly includes license plate recognition and ETC two ways. In the actual application scenario, the license plate may be affected by the environment, rain and snow weather, resulting in insufficient clarity of camera photos, and many times there is no way to smoothly identify, and the user experience is low. In addition, due to the complexity of the ETC system, it is also very difficult to promote to some more common, everyday scenarios.

Compared with the above two, with the support of accurate positioning and high security, UWB can provide a more reliable and cost-effective vehicle "identity authentication" scheme, which can be used for non-inductive access to the parking lot, automatic parking lock and unlock, intelligent charging pile and other scenarios. As a new generation of CAR ID, once the infrastructure is complete, UWB will provide more application solutions.

UWB is also an excellent radar detection technology, which can achieve CPD inside the car, and non-inductive control outside the car. The UWB radar can detect small disturbances in the millimeter level, so whether the child in the locked car is moving, sleeping or fainting, it can guarantee a high probability of detection. Compared with traditional camera or millimeter wave radar schemes, UWB radar has the advantages of good penetration, no fear of occlusion, low power consumption, and no risk of privacy disclosure. In addition, for models with large interior space and complex environment, when the dual anchor solution can be used, the unique collaborative perception (multi-station radar) capability of UWB can be further improved.

In the car application, UWB can bring a new experience of human-car interaction. Combining the positioning information of the UWB key and the action recognition function of the UWB radar, the door, trunk and lights can be controlled without contact through the customized action mode. In addition, when combined with the UWB radar DoA capability, richer and more accurate motion pattern recognition can be achieved.

In the next generation of UWB standard, NBA-MMS technology will be used to achieve enhanced ranging function, so that the UWB link budget will be increased by more than 10dB. At the same time, UWB radar is required to support Frequency stitching, that is, spectrum stitching technology. In the premise of not increasing the bandwidth, only through the digital signal processing algorithm, at the receiving end to splicing several 500M bandwidth signals into a bandwidth of more than 1GHz signal. The advantage of this is that while the chip power consumption and area are not significantly increased, the typical radar range resolution can be improved from 7.5cm to no more than 3.5cm, and there is also a corresponding improvement in angular resolution.

Li Yu introduced that with the blessing of new technologies, UWB can break through the parking perception scene and provide more possibilities for driving perception. After the integration of UWB precision ranging and radar detection capabilities, it can be used to enhance or assist NOA(automatic navigation assistance driving), FCW(forward collision warning) and other functions to provide more protection for vehicle safety, and in terms of V2X, it can provide better solutions for vehicle-road cooperation.