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ST’s new automotive power-management chip reduces car-battery load
The L99PM62XP enables ultra-low standby current designs with fail-safe functionality and optimized system cost.
-- EDN, 10/30/2009 9:07:00 AM
STMicroelectronics has unveiled its new power management chip for car body applications. The device addresses the carmakers’ challenge to reduce the stand-by current consumption (quiescent current) at a time when the number of power-consuming products in the car is continuously increasing. It also provides fail-safe functionality with reduced external components and optimized overall system cost.
ST’s L99PM62XP power-management IC provides a dedicated regulator with optimized dynamic behavior, enabling periodic system activation to monitor configurable wake-up sources, coupled with comprehensive diagnostic and system-status features. Addressing increasing system complexity, ST’s new device integrates fail-safe functionality to improve the sustainability and reliability of automotive electronic-control units. The intrinsic fail-safe concept, including supervision of the microcontroller, supply voltages, and temperatures, prevents the system from locking up under all imaginable failure conditions.
The integration of peripheral functions, such as high-side and low-side gate drivers, operational amplifiers, and auxiliary regulators, reduces the number of external components, optimizing overall system cost. The L99PM62XP offers compatibility with both LIN (Local Interconnect Network) and High-Speed CAN (Controller Area Network) automotive communication protocols for increased performance and versatility.
ST’s newest advanced power management IC targets microcontroller-based automotive applications such as door modules, body-control units and mechatronic subsystems. The L99PM62XP is in production, with unit pricing of $2 for volumes in the range of 1000 pieces.
