Power Line Communications (PLC) Hybrid Products

The PL360B is a programmable modem for narrowband PLC that is able to run any PLC protocol in the frequency band below 500 kHz.

The AT86RF215M is a very flexible sub-1 GHz RF transceiver that supports a variety of data rates and modulation schemes, such as Multi-Rate and Multi-Regional Frequency Shift Keying (MR-FSK) and Multi-Regional Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (MR-OFDM).

Both devices have a history of being deployed in millions of units for smart metering applications. Our hybrid platform combining PL360B and AT86RF215M is the first to achieve official G3-PLC certification for both CENELEC-A and FCC profiles. Our hybrid platform combines PL360G55CF-EK and ATREB215-XPRO boards, which are available for evaluation.

Our PLC hybrid communications software manages the network of hybrid devices. The devices dynamically establish a network link using either the PLC or the radio interface, depending on the network condition, therefore maximizing network coverage. The unique OFDM support for our RF215 device provides up to four times better Frame Error Rate (FER) than standard FSK devices in urban environments. This is especially important to maximize communication robustness or coverage in such environments.

Our PLC hybrid products have achieved the following certifications: