Texas Instruments advances next-generation industrial systems with CAN XL transceiver

Texas Instruments (TI) introduced what it said is the industry’s first commercially available CAN XL transceiver, designed to help industrial engineers keep pace with the growing data demands of modern networks.

The company said that the TCAN6062 Controller Area Network (CAN) extended data-field length (XL) transceiver supports payloads up to 2,048 bytes per frame and data rates as high as 20Mbps, while ensuring that priority messages are delivered first and on time, with the performance on which humanoid robots, industrial robots and human-machine interface (HMI) systems depend.

Texas Instruments said that TCAN6062’s backward compatibility with CAN flexible data rate (FD) and CAN signal improvement capability (SIC) operations enables seamless migration to CAN XL, allowing teams to evolve existing designs incrementally without requiring a full redesign.

Additionally, the company said that the transceiver allows engineers to consolidate communication layers and use Ethernet in mixed-network architectures with Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) tunneling, enabling efficient transfers of diagnostics, sensor data, control traffic and over-the-air updates on a single network.

Why do these communication advancements matter?

TI said that industrial systems are generating and demanding more data than ever before, with applications requiring fast, deterministic communication to synchronize motion control, sensor feedback and diagnostic data. These applications have introduced new networking requirements, often leading engineers to accept system-level trade-offs to compensate for bandwidth constraints. TI said that the TCAN6062 CAN XL transceiver bridges that gap, offering engineers a path to higher-bandwidth networks while maintaining the proven reliability CAN is known for.

The specification for CAN XL has been standardized for years, but Texas Instruments said that it is the first to deliver and bring the hardware that makes it possible to the mass market. By introducing the TCAN6062, TI said that the company is transforming the innovative protocol into a broadly available, ready-to-use technology that engineers can implement in their next-generation designs.

“As industrial systems become more intelligent and interconnected, what we ask of our networks continues to evolve,” said Dwight Byrd, general manager, Interface Products at TI. “Engineers need more data, higher speeds and greater flexibility, all without compromising performance or reliability. TI’s TCAN6062 CAN XL transceiver puts that capability in their hands today, helping them build faster, more capable industrial systems.”

The company said that the TCAN6062 CAN XL transceiver’s SIC helps reduce ringing by as much as 80% in complex networks, simplifying validation in high-node architectures. Combined with wide input/output voltage compatibility and protection up to ±58V, TI added that the transceiver offers broad design flexibility across a range of industrial applications.

TCAN6062 CAN XL and the CiA

As members of the CAN in Automation (CiA) technical group that developed International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 11898-2:2024, TI said that its engineers helped shape the physical layer specification for CAN XL, ensuring the protocol was built to support the real-world demands of industrial applications.

“CAN has been the backbone of industrial communications for decades,” said Holger Zeltwanger, managing director at CiA. “Texas Instruments’ long-time membership and collaboration with CiA builds on that legacy, helping shape CAN XL by contributing to a standard that will guide the entire industry. Now with the introduction of the first commercially available CAN SIC XL transceiver, CAN XL is accessible to engineers worldwide, reflecting our shared commitment to solving the engineering challenges of today and tomorrow.”

Texas Instruments said that the TCAN6062 represents the next generation of its CAN transceiver portfolio. Spanning CAN FD, CAN SIC and now CAN XL, TI said that it offers a comprehensive range of offerings, giving engineers the flexibility to deliver more data faster, farther and more reliably.

“CAN XL opens the door to a new era of applications, enabling systems to deliver higher performance at a reasonable cost. CAN XL is the better and cheaper CAN FD, but can also tunnel Ethernet,” said Arthur Mutter, Ph.D., chairman of the CAN XL Special Interest Group at CiA and senior executive, Networking Technologies at Bosch. “With TI now offering a CAN SIC XL transceiver, system designers can leverage CAN XL to exchange data rapidly (up to 20 Mbit/s) and reliably in all applications, from industrial and robotics to automotive safety.”