Presentation  /  November 12, 2026, 1:20–1:40 p.m.

Towards a Zero Power Radio Receiver – UHF Triband Receiver IC FH101RF for Maintenance-Free Wireless Applications

How can wireless sensors stay connected for years while keeping power consumption to a minimum? Prof. Dr. Heinrich Milosiu presents the ultra-low-power RFicient® FH101RF receiver from Fraunhofer IIS and its potential for long-lasting, low-maintenance IoT applications.

Detailed presentation description

The IoT industry stands at an decisive point: To reach the goal of large-scale autonomous sensor networks regarding the reality of systems limited by their battery life can no longer be solved by excessive human maintenance work. Environmental issues such as battery waste and limited lithium resources demand ultra-low power radio receivers. The Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits IIS has developed the radio receiver RFicient® FH101RF capable of simultaneous data reception across three frequency bands (433 MHz, 868 MHz, and 2.4 GHz). Notably, the IC’s active current consumption for tri-band reception is 7 µA at 1.5 V. A low-cost AG13 button cell can power the RFicient® FH101RF IC continuously for up to four years. Using a AA mignon battery, more than 10 years operating time is reached without battery replacement. In addition, the response time to incoming radio telegrams is very low: 30.5 ms in standard configuration. This can be reduced to 1.0 ms for time-critical applications during operation. RF sensitivity is min. -75 dBm. The IC is manufactured in a 130-nm CMOS technology and supplied in a QFN16 SMD package (3 mm x 3 mm). It is now available in a web shop. Further payload data is spread using special correlation sequences for enhanced interference immunity before transmission. FEC decoding of the radio signals is an integral feature of the receiver IC. This ultra-low power RX IC FH101RF allows many novel applications requiring continous wireless connection. FH101RF-equipped sensors operate for the entire lifecycle on original batteries, reducing maintenance and battery waste significantly. The application fields cover industrial IoT and asset tracking, smart buildings, agriculture and environmental monitoring. Implementations using RH101RF could be mobile IoT smart sensors, smart metering devices, RSSI-based localization, proximity detectors, autonomous radio service interface, intrusion detectors and geofencing applications in logistics.

About the Speaker Prof. Dr. Heinrich Milosiu, Fraunhofer IIS

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Heinrich Milosiu the Masters degree in electrical engineering from the Friedrich-Alexander-University of Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany, in 2002, and the doctoral degree (Dr.-Ing.) in 2012. He has been with Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits IIS in Erlangen since 2002. His research interests are RF CMOS synthesizer design and UHF receiver design in the sub-10 microwatts area. Since 2008, Prof. Milosiu has been project manager for UHF Wake-Up Receiver Design. He has been lecturer at the Friedrich-Alexander-University of Erlangen-Nürnberg since 2014 at the chair of electronics (now LITES) and was announced honorary professor in 2023. Since 2024, he is chief scientist at Fraunhofer IIS. He has authored or co-authored 33 Publications (20 at IEEE), 25 patents and 2 book publications.