Current company owner and CEO – Nebojša Matić started publishing an electronics magazine called "MikroElektronika" in 1997.1 In 2001, the magazine was shut down and MikroElektronika repositioned itself as a company focused on producing development boards for microcontrollers and publishing books for developing embedded systems.
The company started offering compilers in 2004, with the release of mikroPascal for PIC and mikroBasic for PIC – compilers for programming 8-bit microcontrollers from Microchip Technology. Between 2004 and 2015 the company released C, Basic and Pascal compilers for seven microcontroller architectures: PIC, PIC32, dsPIC/PIC24, FT90x, AVR, 8051, and ARM® (supporting STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments and Microchip-based ARM® Cortex microcontrollers).
In conjunction with compilers, MikroElektronika kept its focus on producing development boards while gradually ceasing its publishing activities. Its current generation of the "Easy" boards brand was released in 2012. One of the flagship models, EasyPIC Fusion v7 was nominated for best tool at the Embedded World 2013 exhibition in Nurembeg,2 an important embedded systems industry gathering. Other product lines were introduced as well, including the "mikroProg" line of hardware programmers and debuggers, and the range of sensor and transceiver add-on boards known as click boards.
During this time span the company developed relationships with various semiconductor vendors and distributors. It became an official partner of Microchip Technology, NXP Semiconductors, Texas Instruments, STMicroelectronics, Imagination Technologies, Telit, Quectel, and U-blox.3 MikroElektronika also built up its worldwide distributor network by partnering with Digi-Key, Mouser Electronics, Future Electronics, RS Components as well as more than 50 local distributors in all continents.4
Responding to rising public interest in the Internet of things, in 2016 MikroElektronika released Hexiwear, a wearable development kit created in partnership with NXP Semiconductors. Hexiwear was funded through Kickstarter.5 Since its release on the market, it won four industry awards: Best in Show, Reader's Choice, and Best IoT product at ARM TechCon 2016 Innovation Challenge,6 2016 ECN Impact award,7 as well as Best for Rapid Prototyping at the Hackster Maker Madness competition.8
MIKROE's product catalog includes more than 2,500 products. The following table lists its main product lines.
(for 8-bit PIC microcontrollers)
Each board carries a single sensor or transceiver from numerous vendors.
LoRa click Weather click
Company history from MikroElektronika's website https://www.mikroe.com/about/history/ ↩
embedded AWARD winners and nominees list 2005-2016 https://www.embedded-world.de/en/highlights/embedded-award ↩
Official partners listed on MikroElektronika's website http://www.mikroe.com/about ↩
Official distributors listed on MikroElektronika's website http://www.mikroe.com/distributors ↩
Hexiwear Kickstarter page https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1351029401/hexiwear-a-wearable-development-kit-for-the-iot-er ↩
ARM TechCon official award winners announcement http://www.armtechcon.com/2016-innovation-challenge-winners-demonstrate-exceptional-arm-creativity/ ↩
NXP announces Hexiwear winning ECN Impact award https://globenewswire.com/news-release/2016/11/03/886335/0/en/Hexiwear-IoT-and-Wearable-Platform-Powered-by-NXP-Wins-Multiple-Prominent-Industry-Awards.html ↩
Maker Madness winners announced on Hackster blog https://blog.hackster.io/maker-madness-the-best-iot-boards-of-2016-cfc2382daf64#.x0ycgrajn ↩