What happened to STM32L052 and other small M0+ chips?

[Eric Volpe]

Posted on December 12, 2017 at 02:36

I have a board designed around the LQFP32-package STM32L052K8T6 which is nice because it's small and easy to hand-solder prototypes. Just trying to buy a half dozen more of these chips and I see they're gone from all suppliers with vague mentions of 'maybe April 2018' for resupply.  Are these end-of-life?

It's not the end of the world, it's a simple board and I can redesign it around a L152 or similar, even though it's overkill for the application.  Just wondering if I should consider L0 a dead end.

[waclawek.jan]

Posted on December 12, 2017 at 09:55

They may be simply sold out and - as is quite usual in times of conjuncture - the next batch might take several months to go through the pipe.

It appears that you can get 'L052K6T if you can live with the smaller memory; or 'L051K8T if your application doesn't need USB/touch/DAC/RNG.

JW

[Tesla DeLorean]

Posted on December 12, 2017 at 14:45

When parts have a 26 week delivery time customers need to plan and file orders to get product, some parts will go to places like Mouser, DigiKey, etc, and these will frequently be bought speculatively by people buying the parts to hedge against delays and underestimation in demand. It is also a good arbitrage play by part brokers.

Expect popular parts not to stay in stock. If you have usage expectations discuss with your local ST sales office or reps.

These are parts where ST can sell everything they can make. Check, but I suspect the parts should have a '10 year'* supply commitment.

* Subject to business conditions.

[Eric Volpe]

Posted on December 12, 2017 at 16:33

Ah, thanks guys. I'm not doing this commercially and haven't worked with runs over 50-100 units so I have no experience with how supply chains work!  At any rate I did find there was some stock of STM32L062 which will the bill just fine.

[Tesla DeLorean]

Posted on December 12, 2017 at 16:43

The ridiculous delivery times can cause some very interesting dynamics in popular parts.

http://media.futureelectronics.com/doc/MarketConditionReportQ4October2017v2.pdf

[Jack Peacock]

Posted on December 13, 2017 at 02:47

Nice to know I'm not the only one who just found out about M0+ parts.  Fortunately it was a low volume board run and I have enough time to replace an STM32L071 with the STM32L432.  Far more expensive but at least some are available.  Occasions like this you really appreciate the common peripherals and footprints.

  Jack Peacock