Quectel has launched a Wifi 6 and Bluetooth module with edge AI processing capabilities, designed for smart home, smart building and industrial IoT devices.

Designed for smart lighting, video doorbells and central control hubs, the FCM665D pairs connectivity with on-device intelligence, giving manufacturers a way to build faster, smarter, more capable devices without leaning on constant cloud connectivity.

“This module has the AI capabilities and processing power to compete at the highest level,” said Delbert Sun, vice general manager at Quectel (www.quectel.com). “Smart home and IoT devices are required to do more locally at the edge, from recognising voice commands to processing images in real time, and that requires genuine computing performance. The FCM665D gives our customers that power in a compact module that is easy to integrate and deploy.”

The module contains two dedicated software development kits on a single hardware platform:

• The AI development kit supports voice processing functions including echo cancellation, noise suppression, voice activity detection and keyword spotting, as well as image recognition.
• The audio and video development kit supports multimedia-intensive IoT designs, including audio and video processing, display functionality, and cloud integration.

At the heart of the module is a 32bit triple-core Arm Mv8-M Star MCU running at up to 480MHz. Combined with up to 16Mbyte of PSRAM and 16Mbyte of flash memory, the processor gives connected products the capacity to run demanding AI and multimedia workloads locally instead of repeatedly sending data to the cloud.

This combination of edge AI and multimedia performance makes the module suitable for a broad range of connected devices. Image encoding and decoding capabilities, together with dedicated peripherals, support applications including low-power video doorbells, video door locks and LCDs.

The module’s processor performance and large storage capacity also support multiple network connections and the local caching of long-term operating data for energy storage batteries and photovoltaic inverters. Its edge AI capabilities make it suited to smart home applications such as intelligent lighting and central control systems.

It provides single-band 2.4GHz Wifi 6 connectivity based on IEEE 802.11 b/g/n/ax, with Bluetooth 2.1 and Bluetooth Low Energy 5.4. The module also supports wifi pairing via Bluetooth, helping simplify device provisioning and connectivity.

In addition, the module provides an Ethernet media access controller for LAN communications via a reduced media-independent interface (RMII). Compliant with IEEE 802.3-2015, it enables standards-based Ethernet connectivity across embedded and networking applications. Designed for flexibility and ease of integration, it can be used in network interface cards, data centre bridges and network nodes, helping developers accelerate the deployment of Ethernet-enabled systems.

Support for WPA-PSK, WPA2-PSK and WPA3-SAE security standards, hardware encryption, and TrustZone protection helps safeguard connected devices and their data.

Quectel’s QuecOpen provides 50 GPIOs by default and up to 54 depending on pin multiplexing and memory configuration, giving designers interface flexibility for integrating the module into smart home, smart building and industrial IoT product designs.

Measuring 31.4 by 18.0 by 2.15mm and supporting an operating temperature of -40 to +85˚C, the module is designed for integration into space-constrained consumer devices and industrial IoT applications.