The third major feature of the Kinetis series is the mixed signal integration. That is how the MCU is enabled to measure, process and control real world signals with a digital MCU. These features are on-chip and standard to the Kinetis family, and integrate highly accurate 16-bit Analog to Digital Converters, supported by integrated Programmable Gain Amplifiers which reduces the number of external components and board space requirement.  In addition, there is access to a 12-bit DAC and fully programming analog comparators. To support all three of the previously mentioned modules there is also an integrated voltage reference module, providing a reference point for these modules. The icing on the cake is an integrated hardware touch sensing interface (TSI), a major step forward in enabling designs to replace mechanical buttons with touch pads. The TSI combined with the NXP touch sensing software will provide a more robust solution compared with software implementations only. It will also provide a low power solution compared to standalone software implementations by enabling the MCU to wake up from a touch detection rather than having to continuously wake up the CPU and poll to determine if a touch has occurred. Finally, NXP realizes the importance of providing fully bundled solutions to designs, including hardware platforms to evaluate, combined with software. NXP provides one of the most complete solutions on the market today, offering fully integrated bundles out of the box to speed up the MCU evaluation and product development lifecycles. The goal is to remove barriers to using NXP’s MCUs and enable designers to focus on developing applications instead of attempting to get the different hardware platforms and software components all talking to each other.