Holtek
 | |
| Public | |
| Industry | Semiconductors |
| Founded | 1983 |
| Headquarters | Hsinchu, Taiwan |
Key people |
Keith Wu, Chairperson Gordon Gau, President Patty Li, Vice President Chang Chi, Exec Vice President Armstrong Tsai, Spokesperson |
| Products |
Microcontrollers, Memory Computer peripheral Remote Control, Telecom Power Management, Display Driver |
| Revenue | 3,519 Million Taiwan Dollars for 2011 |
Number of employees | 607 as of September 2012 |
| Website |
www |
Holtek Semiconductor is a Taiwan-based semiconductor design centre and provider. Along with its headquarters and design operations based in the Hsinchu Science Park in Taiwan, Holtek operates worldwide with a wide range of global agents. Holtek's design focus is in both 32-bit and 8-bit microcontroller development with the company having around 650 employees. Holtek also designs and provides peripheral semiconductor products such as remote control, telecommunication, power management, computer peripheral, and memory devices. Holtek's device application area is concentrated in the consumer product field such as household appliances, computer peripheral products, remote controllers, leisure products, medical equipment as well as industrial controllers. Holtek microcontrollers are in home appliances including brands such as Philips, Siemens, Märklin and Japanese brands such as Futaba and Sony.
History
Holtek Semiconductor was established as a design house in Taipei in 1983. From the design of remote control, telecom and voice/music devices, the company moved into microcontroller design. In 1988 the company moved to the Hsinchu Science Park under the name of Holtek Microelectronics and began also its combined manufacturing and design operations. In 1998 Holtek Semiconductor Inc. became a pure design house with its device manufacturing contracted out. The decision to move out of manufacturing and focus on only design reflected many similar companies.
Products
Holtek's design focus is in the area of microcontroller development. Holtek's 32-bit series are based around an ARM Cortex-M0+ and Cortex-M3 cores, and it is producing some 8051 based cores, but the majority of its 8-bit microcontrollers are based on its own self-designed core that is very sililar to the Microchip PIC16 architecture. All have common features such as timers, external interrupts, power-down functions, low-voltage reset, bi-directional I/O pins etc. The range of microcontrollers support clock speeds from 32 kHz up to 20 MHz. Device specific features include functions such as EEPROM memory, A/D converters, LCD interfaces, USB interfaces, operational amplifiers. Some of Holtek's 8-bit microcontroller devices:
- HT32F51XX ARM M3 core based 32-bit series
- HT32F52xx ARM M0+ core based 32-bit series
- HT85F22XX 8051 core based 8-bit series
- HT46RXX A/D type series
- HT46FXX Flash A/D type series
- HT48RXX I/O type series
- HT48FXX Flash I/O type series
- HT49XX LCD type series
- HT56RXX Tiny Power A/D type series
- HT66FXX Flash A/D type series
- HT68FXX Flash I/O type series
- HT82XX Computer Peripheral series
- HT95XX Telecom Peripheral series
Holtek develops other devices, most of which could be classified as microcontroller peripheral devices. One area is that of Low Dropout Regulators where Holtek has provided a range of products with low supply currents. Holtek supports traditional products such as remote control and telecommunication devices. Some peripheral products include:
- HT7XX Power Management Devices
- HT93X/24X Memory Products
- HT12X Remote Control Devices
- HT16XX Display Drivers
- HT9XX Telecom Peripherals
Holtek Semiconductor devices are used in home appliances, computer peripheral equipment, home medical equipment market. The company also provides a design service for customers with specific microcontroller needs. These special microcontroller devices may integrate functions such as smart card interface or medical analog circuitry within the microcontroller.
HT48RXX I/O type series
The HT48RXX I/O Series is a series of Holtek devices optimised for digital applications requiring multiple I/O pins. The device range is supplied with program memory capacities from 0.5K to 16K and is One time programmable, meaning it can be programmed by the user using Holtek supplied programming tools. The Data Memory capacity ranges from 32 to 576 bytes and is RAM type. Devices come in a range of package types from 10 to 64 pins. The 10-pin packages are Ultra Small package types, known as MSOP.
HT48FXX flash I/O type series
The HT48FXX I/O Series devices are optimised for multiple I/O control digital applications. They have program memory capacities from 1K to 8K and a flash memory, which can be reprogrammed using Holtek's programming tools. Data memory capacity is from 64 to 224 bytes and is RAM type. There is also 128 or 256 bytes of EEPROM memory available for non-volatile user data storage. The devices are supplied in a range of packages from 18 to 64 pins.
HT12X remote control Devices
Although designed many years ago, these devices remain popular for simple remote control applications. The devices also remain popular with electronic hobbyists, and appear in electronic magazines such as Elektor and Everyday Practical Electronics.
The devices have a wide operating voltage range and include an internal oscillator circuit requiring only the addition of an external resistor to generate the modulation frequency. Their low power features make them popular in battery powered applications.
Development tools
Holtek also supplies its IDE-3000 development system to support its microcontroller devices. This is a suite of hardware and software development tools which includes real time hardware emulation and software simulation as well as tools for device programming of OTP and flash type devices. Some of Holtek's ICE In-Circuit Emulators also include an integrated device programmer eliminating the need for separate programming tools. The separate programming tools can be operated in a stand-alone mode without a PC connection.