Applications for wearable and smaller IoT battery powered devices are expanding rapidly and market forces continue to demand more features and longer battery life at a lower cost – meanwhile, the semiconductor industry has been slow to address the specific requirements of small battery-powered devices, using existing ICs developed for mobile applications with much higher battery densities instead.

"Load switches currently used to protect wearables and small IoT device batteries were actually designed for much larger devices, where standby or deep-sleep battery drain was not a serious concern," says Eileen Sun, President and CEO of GLF Integrated Power, a company which recently introduced the GLF73510IQ Smart IC.

The GLF7310IQ is a high-efficiency 2A-rated, bi-directional switch with a turn-on threshold to prevent a battery from deep discharge, designed to significantly reduce wearable and IoT device battery discharge during standby or deep-sleep operation. It consumes a leakage current (ISD) of 2 nA (typ.), claiming a savings of up to 10% in battery life, and the compact IC is provided in a wafer-level chip scale package (WLCSP) measuring 0.97 mm x 0.97 mm x 0.55 mm, offering a smaller footprint than legacy solutions – that's a big development for small, resource-constrained devices.

eletter-01-19-2018

eletter-01-20-2018