PSMA Update

Then there is the other side of the unemployment: among engineers it is less than 2%, virtually zero considering mobility and other factors. Microsoft, Apple, Intel and other tech-heavy companies lament about lack of qualified engineers to fill their requirements. They argue for higher H-1B visa quota for professional engineers (H-1B visa allows US employers to temporarily employ foreign workers in specialty occupations-Source: Wikipedia) or open design centers in India, China, Singapore or Taiwan. When it comes to the power electronics, the situation to find qualified engineers is more dire. Enphase Energy based in Petaluma, California, that makes microinverters for solar market lists more than fifty engineering positions for a wide variety of functions including design, manufacturing, quality in a variety of disciplines, including power electronics. For a relatively small, but fast growing renewable energy company this is a significant demand requirement. Similarly, Power-One, the 2nd largest solar inverter company has a list of opening in its renewable energy business. The list of unfulfilled power electronics engineering jobs goes on.

For almost thirty five years, since the beginning of power supply revolution when switching power supplies made entry into mass market, there has been a shortage of power electronics engineers. There are not just enough students graduating in this exotic or esoteric field. Granted, power electronics may not be the most exciting engineering field compared to its digital counterpart or writing software code that can get you a "status job" in Facebook, Google or Apple, but it offers a challenging engineering carrier, lifetime work guarantee and in today's environment, a progressive forward-looking opportunity. There are many new emerging energy challenges appearing on the horizon, from the digital power management in mobile devices and data centers to new forms of energy generation in the renewable energy sector. There are emerging new energy paradigms in the form of smart grid, smart energy harvesting and smart devices. Career opportunities for power electronics engineers are vast and varied, almost endless. Moreover a wide variety of power electronics subjects are available from many universities.

A survey of colleges and universities suggest that in the US alone there are significant number of colleges/universities that teach power electronics in many different forms. Sensing its importance even National Science Foundation (NSF) has gotten into the act and has funded many advanced programs:

Virginia Tech's CPES (Center for Power Electronics Systems) is a public/private partnership program initially/partially (1998-2008) funded by the NSF. In addition to Virginia Tech, there are five other universities participating in this program. It is supported by a wide variety of blue-chip companies, some of which are not even in the power electronics business but sense its strategic importance. For further information, visit www.cpes.edu.

North Carolina State University has FREEDM Systems Center. FREEDM, partially funded by the NSF stands for Future Renewable Electric Energy Delivery. The goal, as stated on the web site, is to create a culture of innovation in engineering research and education that links scientific discovery to technological innovation through transformational engineered systems research. Similar to CPES, there are five other universities participating in this program. For further information, visit: www.freedm.ncsu.edu.

This power electronics education is not confined to the US only but available globally through many premier institutions. For example, Tyndall National Institute located in County Cork, Ireland, has an extensive power electronics program. National Cheng Kung University in Taipei, Taiwan, has an extensive power electronics program. It is alma mater of Bruce Cheng: founder/CEO of Delta Electronics, one of the largest power electronics companies in the world. Taiwan may be the most important country from the power supply standpoint, because it hosts largest number of companies in the large companies category. There are more than twenty five universities that are member of the PSMA: Power Sources manufacturers Association.

There is no dearth of colleges/universities that teach power electronics, but may be a shortage of students of power electronics. While many high school students are familiar with digital electronics, computer science, software engineering and social networking, very few may have heard about the power electronics. But with new emphasis on power and energy, that may be changing. This is especially true for the new emerging field of renewable energy, energy harvesting and energy efficiency. With the global climate change issues on the rise, energy usage and power electronics have started to pervade the social consciousness giving some visibility to this field of power engineering.

TV news is inundated with sad stories of unemployment, with some college graduates moving back to their parents homes and some trying to find alternative careers in medicine and other emerging fields. How about an alternative career in the power electronics?

The views expressed in this article are solely of Mohan Mankikar. They do not represent the views of PSMA. Mohan Mankikar has been a part of the power supply industry for over twenty five years. An active member of the PSMA since its founding, he had been a board member of the PSMA and currently serves on the Advisory Council.