Battery-powered devices can now run AI locally with less power, faster response, and support for always-on functions.
Ambiq has released six new system-on-chip products under its Apollo330 Plus and Apollo510 Lite series. The products are designed for battery-powered devices that need on-device AI processing with low power consumption.
The six variants are Apollo330 Plus, Apollo330B Plus, Apollo330M Plus, Apollo510 Lite, Apollo510B Lite, and Apollo510D Lite. They target applications such as wearables, hearables, augmented reality devices, digital health monitors, and industrial sensors.
The new SoCs deliver up to 16 times higher performance and up to 30 times better AI energy efficiency than earlier Cortex-M-based solutions, according to Ambiq. This allows devices to run AI functions locally with lower latency, rather than sending data to the cloud.
The Apollo330 Plus and Apollo510 Lite series use Ambiq’s Subthreshold Power Optimised Technology (SPOT) platform and Arm Cortex-M55 processors with Helium technology. The devices are designed to support always-on AI functions while keeping power use low.
The SoCs include AI acceleration of up to 8 multiply-accumulate operations per cycle, up to 2MB of SRAM, 2MB of embedded non-volatile memory, and instruction and data caches. A multi-core architecture separates application and network processing to maintain wireless performance while keeping power consumption low.
The Apollo510 Lite series also includes a 2D/2.5D GPU, vector graphics acceleration, and Ambiq’s graphiqSPOT technology for display applications.
Wireless variants include a 48/96 MHz Arm Cortex-M4F network processor and multi-protocol radio. The Apollo330M Plus supports Bluetooth Low Energy, Bluetooth Classic, LE Audio, and Auracast. Matter and Thread support is planned through a future over-the-air update.
Other features include a low-power PDM interface for always-on voice applications, multiple package options including BGA and WLCSP, and wireless transmit output of up to +13 dBm.
For security, the devices use Ambiq secureSPOT 3.0 with Arm TrustZone technology. This supports secure boot, secure firmware updates, and hardware-based protection for sensitive data.
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