GaN Talk Blog

This post, authored by Steve Taranovich, Editor-in-Chief, Planet Analog was originally published August 10, 2018 on the Planet Analog website. Learn more about eGaN technology and EPC GaN solutions for LiDAR.

I have a pathological interest in the promotion of electric vehicles; Formula E racing is one of the most exciting venues for techies like myself. See some of my articles on Formula E in the links at the end of this blog.

What caught my eye recently was a ROBORACE video at a Formula E race track in Rome, Italy:

Enhancement-mode GaN power devices, (eGaN^® FETs and ICs) provide the path for users to differentiate their end products. This new technology gives significantly higher efficiencies in the ever-present power supply and delivery circuits that fuel our gadgets and electronic equipment.

As the sales manager for the Americas, I am in the enviable position of working with customers to create a new vision of excellence so they continue to lead in their market space and contribute optimizing power consumption by reducing energy consumption.

Power systems designs introducing new technologies and approaches is always met with curiosity and evaluation. Customers always ask the most fundamental and far-reaching questions about the attributes and implementation of new technologies. Therefore, I thought documenting the most common questions I have received will help others considering the use of GaN technology pave the way to their confident adoption of this transitional technology.

Ask EPC's chief executive, Alex Lidow, what the future holds for his GaN power device business, and automotive certification features prominently.

Recently delivering AEC Q101-qualified 80 V discrete transistors for LiDAR, 48V power distribution systems and other applications, the company's latest enhancement-mode FETs deliver higher switching frequencies and efficiencies than silicon MOSFETs, in a smaller footprint. And this is just the beginning.

"We have more transistors as well as integrated circuits designed for LiDAR [sensors] and are proceeding with automotive certification here," highlights Lidow. "LiDAR is under intense cost and performance pressure so integrating components and improving performance while lowering the cost is a big deal."

Automotive technology has entered a renaissance with the emergence of autonomous cars and electric propulsion as the driving forces.  IHS Markit estimates that 12 million cars will be autonomous by 2035 and 32 million cars will have electric propulsion according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance, Marklines.  Both trends translate into a large growth in demand for power semiconductors.  This is also happening at a time when silicon is reaching its performance limits in the world of power conversion, thus opening a huge new market for power devices based on gallium nitride grown on a silicon substrate (GaN-on-Si). 

There are many reasons to increase frequency of power conversion.  Fundamentally, these reasons boil down to size/weight reduction, and cost reduction.  There are several components in the design of a power system that must perform efficiently at the targeted increased switching frequencies.  These include power switches, power switch drivers, controllers, magnetics, and capacitors. Taken collectively, these components represent the high frequency power conversion ecosystem.  Without any of these elements, the benefits of increased frequency cannot be fully realized.

Come see the world’s smallest, most efficient, and lowest cost DC-DC converters!  eGaN technology makes this, and much more possible and will be on full display at this year’s American Power Engineering Conference, APEC, where power engineers from around the world gather to see and learn about the latest innovations and products available in the world of power electronics.

EPC GaN experts will be presenting a half-day educational seminar on the state of GaN technology and its application to leading-edge power electronics. In addition, EPC will deliver six technical sessions, as well as demonstrate eGaN applications in our booth and customer suite.

We are quite excited about this year’s CES being held in Las Vegas from January 9th through the 12th.  Our excitement is grounded in the fact that we will be showing the power of GaN technology in two locations – within the AirFuel™ Alliance booth at the Sands Hotel and in our hospitality suite at the Venetian hotel!

Did you see that car? The one with what looks like antlers on the top? Most people would be hard-pressed to miss a self-driving car navigating about public roads. Most autonomous vehicles, or self-driving cars as they are also known, are outfitted with a myriad of sensors, cameras, and even lasers that serve a critical function – providing information about the vehicle’s surroundings. These sensors and cameras are one means of identifying pedestrians, bicycle riders, lane lines, street signs, lights, traffic cones, and other visual details that are important for safe driving.

Written by Michael de Rooij and Alana Nakata - Efficient Power Conversion

Published in: PCIM Europe 2017; International Exhibition and Conference for Power Electronics, Intelligent Motion, Renewable Energy and Energy Management; Proceedings of

eGaN FETs, which are available in non-traditional chip scale packages (CSP) as land grid array (LGA) and/or ball grid array (BGA) formats, have repeatedly demonstrated higher power density and higher efficiency performance than equivalent MOSFETs across various applications ^{[1, 2]}. Those improvements are contingent upon proper layout practices documented extensively in ^{[1, 3]} that minimize unwanted parasitic elements. Over the seven years since eGaN FETs were first launched into the market there have been a total of 127 device failures out of a total of more than 17 billion hours in actual use in the field, 75 of which were a result of poor assembly technique or poor printed circuit board (PCB) design practices ^[4]. Designers are becoming more familiar with the PCB design rules that affect manufacturability and are less forgiving compared to MOSFETs due to their relatively smaller sizes. This paper will cover the various guidelines for PCB design that maximize the performance of eGaN FETs and reliability yet still rely on existing PCB manufacturing capabilities.

I don’t know about you, but in my house the number of mobile devices seems to multiply overnight, along with the ways they are used.  On any given night, you may find me on a GoToMeeting conference on my laptop, my husband on a video Skype chat from his phone with his dad in Florida, my oldest son turning in an assignment on Google Classroom from his laptop, my younger son streaming videos on his tablet, and my second grader recording and posting a music.ly on her phablet.  And when we travel, these devices come with us so they need to be small and lightweight enough to come along for ride! 

This all translates into ever-increasing power demands for computing and telecom systems and the conflicting desire for small, lightweight form factors, and extended battery life. To meet these demands, point-of-load (POL) DC-DC converters (the power engines) need to be designed to be small sized and as efficient as possible. These demands translate to ever faster switching frequencies of the transistors used in the power conversion running these devices. Notebook PCs, tablets, and phablets are especially sensitive to this need as our dependency on these devices and the demands we make on them continues to grow.