NXP’s i.MX9 Gets 10G Ethernet

NXP’s i.MX95 family targets industrial and automotive systems as well as consumer ones. With several CPUs and three computing domains, it exceeds what’s available today, but that gap may narrow by the time it ships.

Bryon Moyer

NXP’s i.MX95 family raises application-processing capacity relative to its predecessor and adds two MCUs for industrial and automotive systems with moderate safety requirements. The company also targets the consumer market. Offering three independent computing domains, the chip simultaneously handles application, real-time, and safety or other low-power MCU processes.

Updating the i.MX8M Plus family, the flagship product has six Cortex-A55 CPUs for application code, accompanied by a Cortex-M7 for real-time code and a Cortex-M33 for low-power or safety-related code. A secure enclave handles both digital and physical protection for the chip, and a new proprietary deep-learning accelerator provides modest inferencing. The wide range of I/Os includes 10GbE for the first time in an i.MX device. Targeting 12–16nm manufacturing, availability is still a couple years away, but samples are scheduled for 2H23 and full production for 2025.

Although the main computing domain can handle any generic code, the real-time and low-power domains support both vehicle and industrial systems. Targeting ASIL B automotive safety, the chip can tackle gateway connectivity, cockpit controls, or infotainment applications, the latter two buoyed by video and display blocks. Industrial applications at safety level SIL 2 enable human/machine interfaces and vision processing; medical devices such as respirators, in-home monitoring systems, and pumps can take advantage of the real-time capabilities.