i-EDGE project

i-EDGE is a project co-funded by the European Union (Horizon Europe programme), the Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI) and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), which aims at developing complex Systems-on-Chip (SoC) based on nanoelectromechanical (NEM) switches for IoT devices operating in harsh environments. The market-oriented demonstrators developed within i-EDGE consist of non-volatile memory (NVM) blocks, field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and sensors as well as power supply and data readout circuitry. Ultimately, the project envisions a monolithic integration of its technology on a commercially available CMOS foundry platform to fully utilize both the cost-effectiveness of conventional semiconductor manufacturing and the unique benefits of NEM switches in a single SoC. Given the very high energy efficiency and harsh-environment capability of the i-EDGE demonstrator systems (use at temperatures > 300 °C; absorbed-radiation doses up to 1 Mrad), i-EDGE will provide electronic solutions that unlock the full power of the IoT for industrial processing and manufacturing, electric vehicles, environmental monitoring as well as health care applications. The i-EDGE consortium comprises eight partners: AMO GmbH, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, TU WIEN Technische Universität Wien, Microchip Technology Nantes, CSEM, SCIPROM Sàrl, University of Bristol and Microchip Technology Caldicot.