Cellular Device-to-Cloud Data Pump

Affordable, embeddable module for low-power cellular connectivity.

Modern industrial and commercial systems increasingly need to securely send data to the cloud, and often enable remote control, as well. These requirements require greenfield or retrofit designs to adapt existing systems to this new operating reality.

The growing danger of connecting devices to the internet using Wi-Fi, combined with the increasing need to track assets while in-motion, has generated tremendous interest in cellular as an alternative for safe and reliable transport of data between devices and the cloud.

To date, however, cellular communications have been equated with high cost, power-hungry devices, and high implementation complexity for hardware and software developers alike.

Functional Description

As an embeddable device-to-cloud data pump, the Notecard eliminates all complexity and friction that exists with existing IoT solutions. It enables development and rapid iteration of production-quality secure cellular, Wi-Fi, or LoRa IoT solutions at an extremely low, fixed cost. With as little as two lines of code on the controlling MCU, and with no external libraries or dependencies, data can be sent from device to cloud.

Notecard is:

• A drop-in embeddable data storage and transport module for cellular IoT products, pumping JSON-formatted or binary data ("Notes") bi-directionally between device and cloud:
  • JSON from/to MCU application using I2C, Serial, or USB.
  • JSON to/from your cloud app using HTTPS or MQTT.
  • JSON is auto-tagged with date/time, tower, and GPS locations.
• A removable and field-upgradable 30mm x 35-42mm system-on-a-module (SOM).
• A cellular device without the monthly fees.

• Ability to add a second MFF2 SIM to provide extended cellular coverage.

Features

• Low-power. Designed to operate on battery power, be "always-on", maintain time & location, while typically drawing less than ~9µA@5V when idle.
• MCU-agnostic. Will support any MCU or single-board computer as your app processor - even low-memory, 8-bit microcontrollers.
• Global. With both narrowband and wideband modems tailored for use in North America or globally, a Notecard can connect in almost any location. See Cellular Service for details.

Decoding Notecard SKUs

Each cellular-based Notecard is supplied a SKU in the format of "NOTE-XXXXX". The following table shows how to decode the differences in Notecard SKUs.

Wideband (LTE Cat-1 Notecards)

See Cellular Band Support for Wideband Notecards

Midband (LTE Cat-1 bis Notecards)

See Cellular Band Support for Midband Notecards

Narrowband (LTE-M/NB-IoT Notecards)

See Cellular Band Support for Narrowband Notecards

• Hassle-free. The integrated, embedded MFF2 SIM features both North American and Global coverage options. No SIM or carrier subscription is required. Includes 10-years of global cellular service with 500MB of data (more data options available upon request).
• Connected. Provides connectivity without the hassle of dealing with SSIDs, passwords, access points, gateways, carriers, or SIMs.
• Secure. Integrated STSAFE Secure Element with hardware crypto, true hardware random number generator, and a factory-installed ECC P-384 certificate provisioned at chip manufacture.
• Simple. Uses a JSON command interface over I2C, UART, or USB. Allows you to connect your 3.3V or 1.8V MCU, while eliminating complex AT commands and state to manage.
• Power-conscious. Integrated GPS with LIS2DTW accelerometer, for power-optimized location/motion awareness. Not to mention a mostly-offline data sync mode for low power, and always-online mode for low latency.
• Encrypted. Secures transactions without any provisioning challenges, using encrypted "off the internet" communication.
• Efficient. Battery-powered cellular without the complexity of managing modems, connections, queues, or storage.
• Integrated. Utilizes an extremely thin cloud infrastructure that directly routes your data to where it belongs: AWS, Azure, GCP, or your own cloud.
• Built for data. Data routing and simple "no code/low code" visual data stream analysis through Notehub.io (SaaS), or host and integrate Notehub functionality into your own app (OSS).

Package Configuration

NOTE-NBGLN - Notecard, Narrowband, Global, 500MB

• Product Name: Notecard Cellular (NB)
• Modem: Quectel BG95-M3
• Data Networks: LTE-M / NB-IoT / GPRS
• General Region: Global (see Cellular Service below)
• Data included: 500MB

View in Store

Modem Datasheet

To best determine the supported bands and radio access technologies, RATs, refer to the modem datasheet.

• Quectel BG95

Block Diagram

The Cellular Notecard is packaged using a compact removable form factor, 30mm x 35mm.

Open hardware schematics for both the Notecard and Notecarrier boards are available on GitHub, making it a straightforward task to embed the Notecard into a broad variety of host device designs.

The Notecard has an embedded MFF2 SIM that enables its included cellular service coverage, with an integrated external SIM switch for applications that require such a capability.

The Notecard can interface with the host MCU at either 1.8v or 3.3v levels.

Typical Application

As shown below, Notecard is not an application processor and hosts no customer application code. It can be used as a data pump peripheral that is focused on bidirectional, asynchronous, secure data staging and transfer of JSON Notes. The Notecard can also be configured as a low powered, autonomous, asset tracking device, in which case it does not require a host processor.

Key Features

• Tracking

  Notes transferred by the Notecard can be tagged with time and location. Location is obtained using a GPS receiver, and time is available from both the cellular network and GPS. To optimize energy use in devices when not in motion, the Notecard has a MEMS-based, LIS2DTW accelerometer that determines when use of the GPS is not required.

• Security

  Modern services require that the cloud and the device perform bidirectional authentication so that neither can be spoofed. For many applications it's important that over-the-air and over-the-wire data is encrypted. For this reason, the Notecard integrates an STSAFE Secure Element which contains symmetric keys manufactured into the chip. Neither the manufacturer of the Notecard nor the manufacturer of the customer's product has any need to handle or manage secure key material. The keys generated by STMicroelectronics for the Notecard use ECC with the NIST P-384 curve, and the signature algorithm is ECDSA-with-SHA384.

• Low Power Consumption

  The Notecard has sophisticated power control and makes heavy use of variable clock speeds. This enables the Notecard to have a typical idle current consumption of ~9µA@5V, while still supporting active UART and I2C communication.

Power Information

The Notecard's main supply voltage (VMODEM_P) is used for the cellular modem and associated circuitry. The Notecard has on-board regulators designed for direct connection to a battery, so any voltage in the range of 2.5V to 5.5V may be provided.

The Notecard typically sits in an ~9µA@5V idle mode waiting for a request from the host MCU, however the Notecard current draw increases to the ~250mA range when the modem is active. Furthermore, when in a region requiring the use of GSM, it can spike to up to nearly 2A for a few milliseconds. The modem also draws 10's of mA when the GPS is receiving or the CPU is performing session encryption. As such, it's recommended that VMODEM_P be directly connected to a battery or other supply that is capable of such brief spikes. It is also recommended that PCB traces for VMODEM_P and GND be designed to handle such current.

The Notecard's logic voltage (VIO_P) is provided by the Notecarrier or host system for digital communication; it will be either 1.8V or 3.3V. Although the Notecard typically draws very little current, this supply should be designed with a 150mA budget allocated to the Notecard.

Antenna Requirements

The Notecard requires a cellular antenna. The antenna should support the entire range of LTE bands in use in the region of deployment.

If an application utilizes GPS location, a GPS antenna is also required. The Notecard design allows the option of a passive or active GPS antenna, and can supply a 3.3V - 4.0V bias voltage to power an active antenna's LNA. If an active antenna requires a different voltage, the board designer can inject whatever voltage they require into the antenna's coax by feeding it to the VACT_GPS_IN pin.

Active GPS

If you choose to connect an Active GPS antenna to the Notecard GPS u.fl connector, you are required to provide your antenna's DC bias voltage to the center conductor of the coax antenna via VACT_GPS_IN. For your convenience and the Notecard supplies a 3.3V - 4.0V power supply at VACT_GPS_OUT whenever it activates its GPS, so VACT_GPS_OUT can be connected directly to VACT_GPS_IN. VACT_GPS_OUT must not be used for any other purpose than powering an active antenna Low-Noise Amplifier.

Cellular Service

A 10-year data plan with 500MB of cellular data is embedded in the Notecard, with more available for applications requiring it. No other actions related to cellular activation or deactivation are required. There are no "know your customer" restrictions, so the Notecard can be embedded in a product without knowing the ultimate end-customer. Placement of a product can be permanent. Although the coverage area may change from time to time because of local technical and regulatory restrictions.

Covered Countries

To approximately forecast the Notecard's compatibility with a country, you can research the networks available (for example on Wikipedia) and cross-reference with the modem datasheet.

*These countries are not covered by the embedded MFF2 SIM, and require use of a user-supplied, external SIM

Cellular Band Support by SKU

Wideband Bands (LTE Cat-1 Notecards)

Midband Bands (LTE Cat-1 bis Notecards)

Narrowband Bands (LTE-M/NB-IoT Notecards)

Pin Information

Pin Definitions

Pin Description

Notecard M.2 Key E, Edge Connector Pinout

Link: Digi-Key part number of the connector - Both Digi-Key and Mouser have pictures for this part number that show a component with a different key, but both have links to datasheet/drawing/CAD models.

Technical Details

Host Microcontroller API

Notecard supports a rich, simple API whose syntax is standard JSON. The developer can communicate requests to Notecard, generally by using little more than printf functions available in most programming languages.

Serial Communication

JSON requests and responses (the Notecard's Application Programming Interface "API") may be sent over any of the following interfaces:

• USB Serial Interface
• UART Serial Interface
• I2C Interface

API Reference

For API usage, names, and parameters, please refer to the Notecard API Reference.

USB Serial Interface

The USB Serial Interface appears to the host as a USB 2.0 Full Speed CDC device. You can access it from Linux, Windows, or macOS without a device driver using terminal emulation software. Newline-delimited JSON requests may be sent directly as UTF-8 text over this port, or you may use the open-source Blues libraries for C, Python, Go, and Arduino.

UART Serial Interface

The UART Serial Interface operates at VIO_P at a fixed baud rate of 9600 using eight data bits, no parity bit, and one stop bit. Newline-delimited JSON requests may be sent directly as UTF-8 text over this port, or you may use the open-source Blues libraries for C, Python, Go, and Arduino.

I2C Interface

The Notecard acts as an I2C secondary device operating at VIO_P, and it implements a simple Serial-over-I2C protocol. You can access it from an embedded host using open-source Blues libraries for C, Python, Go, and Arduino.

Host Microcontroller Hardware Interface

Attention Interrupt

Using software, you can optionally configure Notecard to use the ATTN output pin to:

• Inform the host MCU of certain asynchronous events (such as incoming data availability, or Notecard motion) in an interrupt-driven manner rather than just polling.

• Place the host MCU into a power-off sleep state and wake it back up again.

Auxiliary Ports

An optional Auxiliary UART Serial Interface is available on the AUX_RX_P and AUX_TX_P pins. This interface is inactive unless enabled by raising the AUX_EN_P pin since this UART consumes extra power when in use. It operates at VIO_P at a fixed baud rate of 115200 using eight data bits, no parity bit, and one stop bit. If this interface is unused, the three pins can be left disconnected.

The AUX1-4 pins operate at VIO_P and can be configured in software to operate in several optional modes such as GPS Tracking Mode, GPIO Mode, and Internet Button Mode. If these pins are unused, they can be left disconnected.

Outboard DFU Interface

As an alternative to using the Auxiliary Ports for Outboard DFU, there are also dedicated pins on certain Notecards. For more information on using this interface, check the detailed documentation

External SIM

Notecard contains an integrated, embedded MFF2 SIM but may also be configured to use an external 1.8V Micro-SIM via this interface. This interface is powered by the Notecard. Note that use of an external SIM card also requires that the Notecard be re-configured in software with the APN, access technology, and bands appropriate for the SIM's carrier.

Reset

Use of this pin is optional. If the host system has a global reset line, caution should be used when connecting this pin to the host system's reset because the Notecard may independently pull the line low in software. Restrictions on this pin are:

• If this pin is not used, it must remain not connected (NC).
• The pin is active-low. It must be held low for at least 350nS for a clean reset.
• This pin must never be pulled-up. A pull-up would interfere with the Notecard's own internal watchdog timer and thus will prevent reliable operations.
• Some Notecarriers may invert this signal to be active-high.

Network Communication Behavior

The Notecard includes a built-in connection to Notehub.io (specifically a.notefile.net:8086) and communicates over SSL. Outbound connections speak directly with the Notehub session load balancer (or "Discovery Service") for provisioning and device authentication. By default, the TLS connection is unidirectional, but can operate bi-directionally, if needed. The keys and certificates for each device are provisioned by STMicrosystems inside the STSAFE secure element present on every Notecard. Once the Discovery Service has provisioned or authenticated a device, it issues a "ticket" and a Handler IP address that the Notecard can use to make subsequent requests.

The Notecard can also connect to the Handler to do a constrained set of remote procedure calls related to synchronization. If the Notecard determines that the data queued for transmission to or from the Handler should be encrypted, it opens a session to the Handler on port 8086. Otherwise, an unencrypted socket is opened on port 8081.

The over-the-wire data transmitted on both sockets is highly byte-optimized, which is why raw SSL and TCP sockets are used, and not unoptimized HTTP/HTTPS transactions.

Specifications

General Characteristics

Electrical Characteristics

Absolute Maximum Ratings

DC Characteristics

Ordering Information

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Certifications

Certifications are currently pending.

Board Errata

Terms and Conditions

Visit Blues Hardware Terms & Conditions

Security and Vulnerability Scanning

As a part of our regular audit and scanning process, Blues Inc. performs full vulnerability scanning every six months. Any identified vulnerabilities will be analyzed, reported, and patched in a timely fashion, where appropriate.

Revision History

Contact Information

Blues Inc.
https://blues.com
50 Dunham Ridge Suite 1650
Beverly, MA 01915
support@blues.com