Video: Atmel talks Makers, Arduino and IoT at ESC Brazil

This past August, Atmel had the opportunity to be an exhibiting sponsor at the Embedded System Conference in São Paulo, Brazil. Aside from showcasing our latest IoT solutions, Atmel | SMART product line and AVR microcontrollers, we were fortunate to also have time to interact with the vibrant Latin American embedded community.

Sander Arts, Atmel VP of Corporate Marketing, shared detailed insight into DIY culture, as well as the integral role Atmel plays in fueling the emerging embedded community. Additionally, Arts addressed the growth of the worldwide Maker Movement, showcasing a variety of startups (e.g. Pebble and MakerBot) who each got their start using versatile a range of Atmel 8- and 32-bit MCUs.

“There are over 217, in this particular moment, based and built around an Arduino (and AVR),” Arts revealed. “Specifically, there are over 160 AVR based projects on Kickstarter, of which 103 successful, collecting $7 million in funding.”

Arts went on to explore the newest addition to the Arduino family, the Arduino Zero — a simple, elegant and powerful 32-bit extension of the platform originally established by the popular ATmega328 based Uno.

Arts added that there are now over 1,000 Makerspaces and communities around the world, including a number of nearby Brazilian hackerspaces.

Shortly thereafter, the Atmel VP of Marketing had the chance to sit down with Garoa Hacker Clube’s Luciano Ramalho to further discuss the Maker Movement throughout the region, the company’s role in the DIY movement, embedded solutions and development environments, and of course, the budding popularity of Arduino.

During his Makers Club interview, Arts hinted at a couple of “additional developments around the Internet of Things for Makers,” which we now know was the Arduino Wi-Fi Shield 101 — a shield which enables rapid prototyping of IoT applications using the highly-popular open-source platform.

Throughout the week, there was a tremendous amount of real buzz and excitement amongst the embedded engineers, developers and hobbyists in attendance. Caminhos de Sucesso Editor Jose Antonio Purcino caught up with Atmel Senior Product Marketing Andreas Eieland and EE Times’ Max Maxfield to explore the latest hot trends and topics in embedded design, IoT and wireless.

“The Internet of Things is nothing new, as we have been connecting MCUs to sensors and analyzing the data for a long time,” Andreas Eieland, Atmel Senior Product Marketing Manager, told EE Times. “But what is new is the technology options available for engineers to develop connected systems without the high degree of complexity of the past.”

Next, the Atmel team will be heading to Electronica 2014. Here’s a quick look at the tech you can expect to see next month in Munich.

Preview: Atmel to enhance the IoT experience at ESC Brazil 2014

The World Cup and RoboCup have both come to an end. The Summer Olympics are still another two years away. So why are we heading to Brazil next week? The Embedded Systems Conference, of course! Held August 26-27th in São Paulo, Atmel is excited to be an exhibiting sponsor of this year’s ESC, which will bring together over 5,000 engineers from the vibrant Latin American embedded community.

Whether you live nearby or plan on swinging over to the Transamerica Expo Center, be sure to mark “stopping at Booth E 20” on your daily planner. There, you’ll have a chance to ask Atmel’s Tech Experts your toughest design questions, learn about industry trends, and see live demos of the newly-unveiled Atmel® | SMART™ product line. Experience firsthand how our latest solutions can help achieve high-performance standards, while meeting your power consumption expectations. With our configuration options, you’ll be able to implement our chips in all sorts of applications, ranging from smart metering to wearables. Atmel products are driving a vast majority of IoT and Maker devices in the market today, all of which will be on display during the two-day show.

We’ll be showcasing our complete offering of microcontrollers and microprocessors together with the all-important adjacent technologies like connectivity, sensor solutions, capacitive touch sensing and Atmel CryptoAuthentication devices. Here are several of the smart and secure ‘things’ you can expect to see this week:

Atmel AVR for IoT

Atmel AVR® MCUs are superior in terms of power consumption and are a better suited battery-powered application than any 32-bit MCU. The demo shows the AVR with a wireless connection running of battery. A graphical display also shows power consumption data.

Atmel | SMART SAM D20 QTouch Robustness

The Atmel | SMART SAM D20 QTouch® Robustness showcases not only the high touch performance of this device but also best-in-class conducted immunity and moisture tolerance required in home appliance and industrial applications.

Atmel SmartConnect

The Atmel SAM W23 includes the industry’s lowest-power Wi-Fi tailored for IoT use cases. It is positioned as an add-on turnkey solution for retrofit or new development with a highly scalable MCU approach that leverages the Atmel portfolio.

Thingsquare Open Source 6LoWPAN using Atmel | SMART SAM R21

The Atmel | SMART SAM R21 shows the latest generation of ultra-low-power ARM Cortex® M0+ based wireless MCU combined with an open source IPv6/6LoWPAN embedded communication stack provided by Thingsquare. The application targets ultra-low power-applications in home and building automation. The solution is also ideal for gas and water meters, which demand years of maintenance-free operation on a single battery cell.

Atmel | SMART SAM D20 GPS Tracker

The GPS asset tracker reference design with GSM connectivity is controlled through SMS messages and can support features like geo fencing, automated alarms, panic button and position tracking to SD card. It uses an accelerometer to determine if the GPS should be enabled or not, allowing lower power consumption. The high number of serial communication interfaces on a small, low power device makes the Atmel | SMART SAM D20 a perfect fit for asset tracking applications.

Atmel | SMART SAMA5D3 Qt-based Applications

The Atmel | SMART SAMA5D3 is a versatile, high-performance, low-power embedded MPU shown here in home automation and smart fridge applications. The demo also shows the SAMA5D3’s UI capability and system performance on a WVGA screen resolution.

Atmel QTouch

Atmel | SMART SAM D21+ QT1 Xplained Pro demonstrates high-performance Atmel QTouch button, slider and wheel use for easy integration in any application requiring human control. The SAM D20 + QT2 Xplained Pro demonstrates QTouch Surface ideal for any consumer or wearable application.

Atmel CryptoAuthentication Devices

The Atmel CryptoAuthentication ATSHA204A is an easy to use, low-power hardware key storage device. The demo shows symmetric authentication between the drill (host) and client (battery). Each contains an ATSHA204A with identical stored secret keys. The drill sends a random number“challenge”to the battery, which processes that with its secret key to send a coded response back to the host to verify if the stored secret keys indeed match.

Also, don’t miss Sander Arts, Atmel VP of Corporate Marketing, present on how Atmel is fueling the Maker Movement. Arts will share insights into Atmel-based Arduino boards, the growth of the worldwide Maker community, as well as how Atmel microcontrollers were there from the outset, providing simple but powerful MCUs as the hardware side of the equation. Discover why a countless number of artists, designers, inventors, engineers, musicians and even students are turning to Arduino boards designed around Atmel AVR® or Atmel | SMART MCUs to transform their ideas into fully-functional “things.” Details on the session can be found below!

Title: Atmel and the Maker Movement
Presenter: Sander Arts, VP of Corporate Marketing, Atmel Corporation
Date / Time: Tuesday, August 26th @ 5:00 pm
Location: Makers Club

So there you have it, folks! Don’t forget to visit Booth E 20, pick up your Atmel Xplained Mini Kit, chat with a tech expert and of course, partake in a number of hands-on demos!