News: Microelectronics
20 January 2021
Bel Power and Transphorm announce family of Titanium efficiency AC-to-DC power supplies
Transphorm Inc of Goleta, near Santa Barbara, CA, USA — which designs and manufactures JEDEC- and AEC-Q101-qualified 650V and 900V gallium nitride (GaN) field-effect transistors (FETs) for high-voltage power conversion applications — and Bel group company Bel Power Solutions says that six of Bel’s Titanium efficiency power supplies use Transphorm’s high-voltage GaN FETs, indicating the growing trend of high-performance, wide-bandgap power supply units (PSUs) being deployed in data-center servers, routers and network switches.
Picture: Transphorm's high-voltage GaN devices are used in six of Bel Power's AC to DC TET series power supplies, enabling Titanium efficiency power conversion for data centers.
The six GaN-based TET series PSUs are AC-to-DC front-end supplies. They include the TET3000 series, claimed to be the industry’s first AC-DC supplies to achieve Titanium efficiency with GaN being used in the AC-to-DC bridgeless totem-pole power factor correction (PFC) power stage — a product that has since been modified using the same circuitry with firmware improvements to become the TET3200 series based on customer interest in higher power output. The remaining four TET series range in power levels from 1.5kW to 2.5kW and are packaged in standard 1U or common redundant power supply (CRPS) rack-mount form factors. The entire family is said to deliver greater than 96% efficiency at high line with a main output of 12VDC, earning the PSUs an 80 Plus Titanium rating.
GaN for data-center power
GaN power converters offer fundamental advantages compared to silicon in power applications. Specifically, Transphorm’s GaN FETs are proven to increase the efficiency of the AC-to-DC PFC stage to more than 99%, increasing power density while reducing the overall system cost — all with a published field reliability of <1.0 FIT (failure in time).
As a result of these benefits, the use of GaN power transistors is expected to increase rapidly over the next few years. In fact, market research firm Omdia recently forecasted that the compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of GaN power transistors used in data-center power supplies will be 66.5% from 2019 to 2024.
“Our legacy is working with large data centers, creating a catalog of targeted power solutions that service the wide scope of applications used by our customers by leveraging cutting-edge technologies for the best possible performance results,” says Bel Power Solutions’ business development manager Ian Warner. “We’ve been designing with Transphorm’s GaN for more than six years now. The efficiency and reliability we’ve been able to achieve to date has helped us create the TET family of supplies that are exceeding customer expectations with an unparalleled solution,” he adds. “We’re changing what’s possible in data centers and Transphorm is a contributor to that movement.”
“We’ve seen high-voltage GaN positively disrupt industries over the past few years,” says Philip Zuk, Transphorm’s VP of worldwide technical marketing & NA sales. “The data-center market is next. Transphorm’s technology performance is proven in excess of 10kW in various applications. Our device cost is driving down closer to silicon with each generation. And, we set the industry benchmarks for quality and reliability. We’re unsurpassed in that area, making our GaN devices an optimal choice for data-center solutions,” he reckons.
