Maxim’s New DeepCover Secure MCU Simplifies EMV Contactless Payment Terminals

Maxim Integrated Products’ new MAX32560 DeepCover secure microcontroller (MCU) to enable manufacturers of mPOS terminals, ATM keyboards, EMV card readers, contact/contactless pin pads, and other mobile payment devices to save PCB space and reduce the BOM while bring products to market quickly.

The new device meets the latest PCI-PTS standards with embedded security features including active tamper protection, scrambling keypad for PIN handling, and a secure cryptographic engine.

It is also sought to integrate a number of analog interfaces to reduce the PCB footprint, including a full EMV contactless reader interface, two EMV smart card interfaces, a DSP-based high performance magnetic stripe reader, 2-channel ADC, and a DAC.

With this new rollout, Designers of mobile payment devices can obsolete the use of multiple external ICs for memory expansion, contactless interface and amplifier, ISO7816 PHY, magnetic stripe interface, and battery switch functions – as the new MAX32560 DeepCover secure ARM Cortex-M3 microcontroller leverages features of all into a single chip, eliminating the need for up to six external chips.

Key Advantages

Secures Systems: Cloaks sensitive data under multiple layers of advanced physical security to provide the most secure key storage possible

Saves Space and Time: Integrates multiple functions into one small chip, reducing PCB size and time to market, and simplifying the EMV and PCI-PTS certification processes

Saves Power: Features a number of power saving modes to minimize power consumption and optimize battery life

Citing on the new rollout, Gregory Guez, Director, Embedded Security, Maxim Integrated, said, “Achieving a level of integration that has never been done before, the MAX32560 is the first single chip solution that brings together the functions and interfaces required to build new generations of trusted devices for EMV contactless, smart, and magnetic stripe cards. Because the MAX32560 comes with a pre-certified EMV-L1 contact and contactless software stack, it can be quickly deployed to new designs. To empower our customers with a turnkey solution, Maxim teamed with Alcineo to provide EMV-L2 stack support.”

“In a constantly evolving payment industry, Alcineo is working with Maxim to help our customers develop the safest and most innovative devices,” said Arnaud Corria, CEO at Alcineo. “The MAX32560 combines a new level of functionality with the highest level of security for modern financial pin pad and mPOS products.”

Additionally, the MAX32560 offers 1MB of embedded flash memory, 384KB of SRAM, and 8KB of secure NVSRAM. The memory can be further expanded through external fast serial flash memories via a flexible QuadSPI controller with XiP, and can quickly read and decrypt code or data using an on-the-fly AES engine. For communication interfaces, the MAX32560 provides a USB device port, three SPI controllers, two UARTs, and two I²C controllers. It is available in a 9mm x 9mm BGA144 package and operates across the -40-degree Celsius to +85-degree Celsius temperature range.

Availability and Pricing

• An evaluation kit is available: MAX32560-KIT#
• MAX32560-KIT# pricing starts at $1,500
• MAX32560 pricing starts at $9.41 (1,000-up, FOB USA)