Will Power Empower the Electronics Industry?

he Power Sources Manufacturers' Association (PSMA) published its tenth and latest edition of  the Power Technology Roadmap (PTR 2017).  PSMA undertakes this project, where participants from respective fields analyze trends in key power supply parameters, applications, components and emerging technologies, once every two years. From its early days in 1994, when the first PSMA Power Technology Roadmap was released, it has gone through significant evolution in its scope and content.  

This edition of the Roadmap is a product of two-year effort involving 82 participants that includes online webinars, technical articles and online surveys that provided inputs for forecasting. The webinar topics are wide-ranging and all-encompassing, covering as many aspects of power supply technology as possible. Webinars in this edition of the Roadmap include wireless transfer, component technologies, passive devices, high frequency magnetics, isolation technologies and many others. The technical articles are very focused in their pre-defined subject matter and the online surveys are designed to gather information to project future trends in key parameters. Such a unique combination of subjects and scope prepared with the inputs of knowlegable participants from the industy, makes this report unique and highly comprehensive.

The Roadmap provides both a quantitative and a qualitative analysis of technology. While the online surveys are used to gather quantitative data, the qualitative analysis is provided by industry experts who have contributed to the report either by presenting a webinar or by writing an article on a specific topic.

• Trends in key metrics in following power supplies and converters:
  • Ac-dc front-end power supplies (200 W – 2000 W)
  • External ac-dc power supplies (10 W – 100 W)
  • Isolated dc-dc converters (100 W, regulated)
  • Non-isolated dc-dc converters (subdivided into the standard non-isolated dc-dc and power supply in a package (PSiP) converters)

These products were selected because they are widely used in the industry. The same products were used in the past, thus making a comparative analysis easy. The key metrics used for trend analysis include efficiency, cost, power density and reliability. With 2016 as the base year, the projections were done for 2019 and 2021. In addition, the report provides some retrospective analysis that checks past forecasts, to see if they were accurate or inaccurate. This analysis will be used to make any future adjustments.

• Component technology that includes, power semiconductors, ICs and magnetic materials   
• Applications trends and emerging Technologies:

Application trends are included for automotive, computing, consumer, lighting, medical, motor control, battery changing and energy harvesting. The emerging technologies are associated with magnetics, integrated magnetics, 3D power packaging, additive manufacturing and nanofluids.

The Roadmap is an important report that can provide companies with information about various technologies, data for benchmarking their current products and technology trends for strategic planning.

The organizers for the 2017 PSMA Power Technology Roadmap have made an interesting argument that the Roadmap is designed to "Empower the Electronics Industry". It is stated in the title of the report. At first glance, the concept that power supply technology will empower the electronics industry seems like wishful thinking or even preposterous, but it should not be rejected out of hand. Dr. Conor Quinn, Co-Chair of the organizing committee gave a plenary presentation at APEC 2017 in Tampa that focused on this stream of thought.

Dr. Quinn stated, that in the past the power supply industry was technology-responsive to all established and traditional markets such as consumer, computers and networking. Companies or industries engaged in these markets did not much care about the development of power supplies as these markets designed their own products and then purchased a power supply as an afterthought to fulfill their specific needs. However, this may not be the case in the development of emerging new markets including automotive, solar inverters, variable frequency drives and LEDs. These markets are power-technology driven markets. Power is not a secondary after-thought, but is central to the development of these markets. Many new applications are power-centric as alternative energy and efficient use of energy takes center stage in the development of future markets. For companies participating in such new products, knowledge of the power supply technology and its evolution will be essential for their successful development. The new 2017 Power Technology Roadmap will provide that information, knowledge and insight. It is designed to empower the electronics industry.

Provided by Mohan Mankikar, President, Micro-Tech Consultants

If you or anyone in your company is interested in getting on the distribution list for future issues of PSMA UPDATE, please send e-mail to: power@psma.com. Be sure to include your name and the name of your company.