BELLEVUE, Wash.—South Korean foundry Dongbu HiTek said Thursday (June 14) that IC power chip vendor Enpirion Inc. is using its specialized analog CMOS process (AN180X) for its DC-DC converters with a chip area that is 40 percent smaller than competing alternatives at comparable performance.
The new 12V converter family underscores Enpirion’s focus on miniaturizing DC-DC power systems for telecommunications, enterprise, industrial embedded computing and storage applications, according to a statement by Dongbu HiTek.
Enpirion reports that its new EN2300 converter family, implemented with Dongbu HiTek’s AN180X process, achieves the industry’s best figure of merit to operate at high frequencies while reducing switching losses, Dongbu said. The 12V RF-LDMOS transistors used in the AN180X process specify a cut-off frequency of 37.7GHz, the highest level ever reached for this class of converters, the firm said.
According to IHS iSuppli, the worldwide market for DC-DC converter ICs is forecast to grow from approximately $9.5 billion in 2011 to about $13.2 billion in 2016, representing a compound annual growth rate of about 6.8 percent over the five year period.
Dongbu HiTek recently presented a technical paper on the innovative RF-LDMOS structures developed for its AN180X process at the 24th annual International Symposium on Power Semiconductor Devices, which took place last week in Belgium.