News: Microelectronics
14 April 2020
Transphorm introduces SuperGaN power FETs with launch of Gen IV GaN platform
Transphorm Inc of Goleta, near Santa Barbara, CA, USA — which designs and manufactures JEDEC- and AEC-Q101-qualified 650V gallium nitride (GaN) field-effect transistors (FETs) — has announced availability of its Gen IV GaN platform. Transphorm’s latest technology offers advances in performance, designability and cost compared with its previous GaN generations. Transphorm has also announced that Gen IV and future platform generations will be called SuperGaN technologies.
The first JEDEC-qualified SuperGaN device will be the TP65H300G4LSG, a 240mΩ 650V GaN FET in a PQFN88 package. The second SuperGaN device is the TP65H035G4WS, a 35mΩ 650V GaN FET in a TO-247 package. These devices are currently sampling and will be available in second-quarter and third-quarter 2020, respectively. Target applications include adapters, servers, telecoms, broad industrial and renewables. System designers can assess the technology in Transphorm’s TDTTP4000W066C-KIT 4kW bridgeless totem pole AC-DC evaluation board.
SuperGaN technology
When designing Gen IV, Transphorm’s engineering team drew on learnings from production ramps of previous products, coupled with a drive for performance, manufacturability and cost reduction to design a new product with simplicity and substantial improvements. The new platform’s patented technology delivers benefits that augment Transphorm’s intrinsic GaN performance and simplicity both in assembly and applications, which is the catalyst for the SuperGaN brand, the firm says.
Driven by its patented technology, SuperGaN Gen IV benefits are said to include:
- increased performance: Gen IV provides a flatter and higher efficiency curve with an improved figure of merit (RON*QOSS) of about 10%.
- easier designability: Gen IV offers increased simplicity of design-in by removing the need for a switching node snubber at high operation currents;
- enhanced inrush current capability (di/dt): Gen IV removes the switching current limits for the built-in freewheeling diode function in half bridges;
- reduced device cost: Gen IV’s design innovations and patented technology simplify device assembly too - the resulting cost adjustments continue to bring Transphorm’s GaN closer to silicon transistor pricing;
- proven robustness/reliability: Gen IV’s 35mΩ FET offers the same gate robustness of +/-20Vmax and noise immunity of 4V that is currently delivered by Transphorm’s Gen III devices.
“We expect Transphorm’s SuperGaN FETs to continue to impact next-gen power electronics as the evolution of silicon superjunction MOSFETs did,” says Philip Zuk, the firm’s VP of worldwide technical marketing and NA sales. “Our Gen IV GaN platform is creating new design opportunities in other power stages through better performance while increasing customers’ overall ROI,” he adds. “Our ability to reduce losses and bring the initial device investment down closer to what customers are used to with silicon without sacrificing reliability is another indicator that GaN’s position in the marketplace is strengthening.”
