STMicroelectronics announces KNX-RF software for energy-efficient building automation

     STMicroelectronics releases KNX software for use with S2-LP ultra-low power RF transceivers to enable energy-efficient control of smart buildings with standardized wireless communication functions. The new software can run directly on either the STM32 microcontroller (MCU) or the BlueNRG-2 Bluetooth Low Energy Low Power System-on-chip (SoC), which includes a 32MHz Arm® Cortex-M0 processor and various I/O peripherals. The software components include the certified KNX-RF protocol stack, RF adaptation layer, and S2-LP library required to connect transceivers to build ultra-low power wireless KNX nodes. The S2-LP is a market-leading RF transceiver communicating in the 868.3MHz band, with a power consumption of only 10mA and an output power of + 10dBm, enabling energy-efficient, secure and robust wireless connections that extend battery life and reduce the overall cost of the solution.

     The combination of the S2-LP RF transceiver and the BlueNRG-2 system chip enables a unique low-power KNX/Bluetooth dual-network solution with both chips, allowing users to access the KNX network from their smartphones and easily monitor, configure, connect and update KNX nodes in an intuitive and stylish user interface.

     Whether running on BlueNRG-2 or STM32 MCUS, ST's KNX-RF software enables innovative features and energy savings in home appliances, such as switch buttons, light fixture switches, room occupancy sensors, sunshade controllers, dimmer actuators, and more. And control switches for electric heating, HVAC systems and energy harvesting systems.

     The software complies with the latest KNX-RF Multi specification, which supports secure (S mode), encrypted communication, and a five-channel frequency hopping mode, where the frequency hopping mode helps to avoid signal interference, select fast and slow communication modes, and save power. Other features of the KNX-RF Multi standard increase connection reliability and allow a large number of KNX devices to be present on the network at the same time, including Listen Before You Talk (LBT), fast confirmation with automatic retry, and support for Repeaters.

     To develop this new KNX-RF Multi software, ST worked with licensing partner Tapko to develop a certified KNX protocol stack and with licensing partner Actimage to develop an RF adaptation layer.

     The S2-LP transceiver has been added to ST's STKNX family of highly integrated Twisted Pair KNX TP communication transceivers, expanding the company's range of certified intelligent building communication solutions covering major industry standards. In addition to KNX wired and wireless communication solutions, ST also provides embedded software, evaluation tools and mobile applications to accelerate the development of Bluetooth Low Energy Mesh and 6LoWPAN networking solutions for smart buildings and industry. Both S2-LP and BlueNRG-2 are included in ST's 10-year product Supply Guarantee Program.