News

Power Supply-on-Chip Workshop Draws Record Attendance

September 24, 2008 by Jeff Shepard

The First International Workshop on Power Supply-on-Chip (SoC), held in Cork, Ireland, from September 22-24, showed that dc-dc converters on silicon may be closer to commercial reality than previously thought. Sponsored by Tyndall National Institute, one of Europe’s leading research centers, the PwrSoC Workshop drew an international audience of over 120 individuals from companies, universities, and research institutions. Tyndall and other researchers have been working on next-generation power supply technology that would change the way power is delivered to a broad range of applications, from portable to automotive to communications.

The conference program was an intense, two-and-a-half days of 34 presentations that provided background on passive and active integration, current research and product development, and challenges to commercialization. Market drivers and economic issues were presented, along with the technical challenges still facing power supply-on-chip technology. In some cases, definitions are still being hammered out in order to define what constitutes a "fully integrated package."

Tyndall says that power SoC technology will allow the bulky magnetic components to be miniaturized to such an extent that they can be integrated with the silicon chip into a power SoC component with a profile as small as 1mm. Integrating the magnetics and capacitors poses significant challenges that a number of researchers are addressing. Companies like Intel are pushing to control the power at the load, not the power source.

Multi-core processing is just one of the drivers for power supply-on-chip, however. Energy efficiency, mobility and small board size, broadband technology and battery savings were all cited as factors that will eventually provide an alternative to the power supply module. Balancing these drivers are major issues that still need to be hammered out. Chief among these are cost, efficiency and reliability. The key technical challenges are magnetics, integrated capacitors and higher switching frequencies.

Although specifics differ, the general consensus is that future power supply-on-chip technologies will operate at 50A and below, with switching frequencies of 10 to 100MHz. The frequency range for most magnetic materials is less than 10MHz, so there is ongoing research in magnetic materials that are suitable for higher frequencies. Newer package styles like DrMOS are expected to help enable these higher frequencies. In addition, the higher current levels will increase efficiency.

Although several companies presented papers at the Workshop, no real commercial products exist yet. Companies like Enpirion, Fuji Electric and Linear, among others, have products that integrate passive and active components to one degree or another. Mainstream adoption will not occur until low-cost products appear, however, and that leads to why this conference is appearing now and drawing such a broad audience.

The speakers and conference organizers agreed that an interdisciplinary approach to power supply-on-chip is essential. Technologies, application needs, manufacturing ability and packaging have all converged to the point that a power SoC solution is not only possible, but quite likely required in certain applications. Semiconductor manufacturers, materials researchers, system makers and power supply designers all need to come together to address the problems of functional and packaging integration. The PwrSoC Workshop is a first step in that direction, and Tyndall is already planning for the next conference.