Hoping to boost widespread adoption of important vehicle safety features, the SH77650 single-chip SoC for image-recognition processing functions forecasts production of more affordable vehicle information terminals, particularly the next-generation car navigation systems and peripheral devices. In addition to automotive applications, the SH77650 is suitable for security equipment in business and industrial applications. The 300-MHz device's intellectual property from Hitachi encompasses an image-recognition processing accelerator that can run multiple external image recognition programs such as roadway lane recognition or external vehicle detection and tracking in real time. For development of such applications, an image-recognition library containing approximately 200 functions is available. Operating at 300 MHz, the SH-4A CPU core in the SH77650 achieves a processing performance of 540 MIPS. The on-chip FPU, which supports both single- and double-precision calculations, delivers 2.1 GFLOPS in single-precision mode. Additionally, the SH77650 includes a dedicated DMA controller, timers, a serial communication interface, CAN interface, and a bus arbitrator supporting three access priority levels. Sample price is $51 each. RENESAS TECHNOLOGY AMERICA INC., San Jose, CA. (408) 382-7407.