1,000-A voltage regulator solution targets AI, 5G designs

By Majeed Ahmad, contributing writer

The new voltage regulator from Infineon Technologies AG enables currents of 500 A to 1,000 A and higher for CPUs, GPUs, FPGAs, and ASICs serving artificial intelligence (AI) and 5G wireless applications. Infineon claims that its high-current chipset XDPE132G5C is the industry’s first 16-phase digital PWM multiphase controller.

The current-related requirements in CPUs serving AI and networking workloads demand that DC/DC voltage regulators deliver more than 500 A to the load. XDPE132G5C addresses this requirement by incorporating a 16-phase digital PWM engine and an improved transient algorithm.

The active current sharing between phases enables a reliable, compact, and cost-saving design. Moreover, XDPE132G5C circumvents the need for extra logic doubler ICs commonly used in high-phase-count designs. The regulator chip is packaged in a 7 × 7-mm 56-pin QFN to accommodate 16 phases.

The ASICs and FPGAs serving communication systems like 5G networks require V_out control of less than 1-mV steps, and the XDPE132G5C offers this as an inherent feature with a V_out setting in 0.625-mV increments. It also fulfills auto-restart requirements in communication designs by significantly reducing remote site maintenance following power or system glitches.

When paired with the TDA21475 integrated current sense power stage, the XDPE132G5C controller can deliver over 1,000 A. The 70-A rated power stage, packaged in a 5 × 6-mm footprint, delivers more than 95% efficiency.