ST says the part is the lead product in a family of car networking devices addressing CAN and LIN bus automotive body applications including the door module, window lift, dashboard, seat modules, sunroof, climate control, hands-free mobile phone, and exhaust-gas recycling control.

Development support is provided by third-party emulators from Hitex and iSystem, and by ST's DVP3 development kit. An inDART starter kit is available from SofTec, and a network prototyping kit from Phytec should be available soon. ST's own programming board for the ST72F561 is already available.

The MCU family is available in 60 kB and 32 kB Flash memory versions. ROM versions are expected soon at 60 kB, 48 kB and 32 kB. All feature a CAN cell supporting 29-bit identifiers, with enhanced message filtering to reduce software overhead and CPU load even in complex CAN networks. The Window Watchdog provides more robust system monitoring than a traditional watchdog module, according to the company. Two LINSCI interfaces with built-in LIN protocol frame break support provide LIN communication, for reduced CPU load compared to a UART-based solution. The ST72F561 can perform as either a LIN master or slave.

The ST72F561 uses an industry-standard 8-bit core with an enhanced instruction set. Power consumption in standby mode is typically less than 1 microamp and less than 50 microamps when its auto wake-up feature is used.