Power Integrations announced that PowiGaN gallium nitride (GaN) technology is now rated at up to 2200V, far exceeding the voltage capabilities of all other commercially available GaN technologies.
This positions PowiGaN as one of the best technology solutions for high-voltage data centres, EVs, renewable energy, and HVDC infrastructure.
“Our 2200V PowiGaN technology provides substantial voltage margin for emerging high-voltage power systems while enabling the high switching frequencies required to maximise power density,” said Jennifer Lloyd, President and CEO at Power Integrations. “Emerging applications include next-generation AI data centres, where industry roadmaps point toward 1500V distribution architectures, as well as future EV battery and auxiliary power systems operating at increasingly higher output voltages (48V). This milestone breakthrough extends the reach of GaN into voltage ranges traditionally served by SiC, enabling a compelling high-frequency alternative for applications such as solar, HVDC and advanced industrial power conversion.”
GaN power switches are steadily supplanting silicon transistors in a wide range of power conversion applications thanks to their higher efficiency and switching frequencies. However, GaN technology must keep pace with data centre, EV, renewables, and HVDC infrastructure roadmaps calling for higher voltages and greater power density. Alternatives include lower-frequency silicon carbide (SiC) or arrays of stacked, lower-voltage GaN devices that require compromises on power density, complexity and reliability.
“Everyone else has 650 or 900V GaN and has to stack a bunch of devices together to address an 800V bus, and that adds a huge amount of complexity – floating gate drives, multiple switching stages,” said Roland Saint-Pierre, Vice President of Product Development at Power Integrations, in an exclusive interview with Electronic Specifier. “Power Integrations has always been about reducing and simplifying the power supply, not adding stages. Doing it the right way means doing it with the right voltage device in the first place, and 2200V gives designers and engineers a genuine step change rather than another workaround.”
PowiGaN ICs rated at 1700V are already being designed into single-stage data centre auxiliary power applications, while 1250V PowiGaN offers a simpler alternative to stacked solutions in the main power path in 800VDC data centres. The introduction of 2200V PowiGaN technology means that even higher bus architectures can be supported, future-proofing power designs not only for data centers but also for EVs, photovoltaic inverters, and battery-energy storage systems.
“The shift to 800VDC bus architectures in AI data centres is reshaping power semiconductors,” explains Roy Dagher, PhD, Technology and Market Analyst, Compound Semiconductors at Yole Group. “GaN’s voltage ceiling has kept it out of the main power path, ceding that ground to SiC. A 2200V rating changes this, giving margin for single-stage topologies and future-proofing emerging 1500V data centre and EV designs. We expect the power GaN device market to reach $3.5 billion by 2031, and extending GaN into these higher-voltage applications is an important part of that growth.”
“Reliability is the core of what we want to accomplish with PowiGaN,” said Saint-Pierre. “We are extremely proud that our cascode structure gives us unmatched robustness and the lowest failure-in-time rate in the industry, and that built-in margin is exactly why we’re confident this technology is ready to move from demonstration into the product developments we’re already working on.”
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For further information, please read this whitepaper or visit the PowiGaN page.
