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POWER MONITOR: Stationary applications for portable power management

Darnell Group has identified a new class of “stationary applications” for portable power-management ICs and over a billion voltage regulators. With applications, power levels, architectures and technologies varying widely, we have classified several high-volume stationary battery-powered applications, including wireless-sensor mesh networks that will consume an estimated 1.6 billion voltage regulators annually within the next five years. We anticipate that growth rates for unit sales in non-automotive applications will be about 27% annually for the next five years. And, in many regards, Europe is leading the way.

Energy harvesting, micro batteries and power-management ICs are in a position to enable the commercial deployment of the next generation of low-power electronic devices and systems. System builders are utilising lowpower devices for wireless as well as wired systems, such as mesh networks, sensor and control systems, MEMS (micro-electro-mechanical systems), and RFID (radio-frequency-identification) devices. Applications include building/industrial automation, medical, homeland security, military and commercial systems, gaming, transportation and many others.

As this market is emerging, you can choose many different metrics to define the ultra-low-power, wirelesssensor- system market. Applications, power levels, architectures and technologies vary widely, making forecasts challenging. Some applications use single-sensor units; others employ large wireless mesh networks. Powering can be wired or wireless, active or passive, battery back-up or battery-less. Power levels vary from below 1 mW to 1W or above.

You can use wireless-sensor mesh networks to detect changes in temperature, pressure, moisture, light, sound or magnetism, and most often you would power such systems by batteries. Sensor networks can include 10 to 100,000 nodes, and scalability can be a problem. Node position may not be predetermined. The lifetime of a sensor network depends on the battery lifetime, and once you have deployed a large number of sensor nodes, relocating and recharging them can be difficult.

Designers who are contemplating using energy-harvesting techniques often cite battery maintenance and replacement as the biggest reason to explore that option. The first markets for these new technologies have been applications where batteries are problematic, such a building and home automation, military and avionic devices, communications and location devices, and transportation.

Our latest analysis and forecast partitions the wireless-sensor-system market in five ways: by application; by power level; by their use of microbatteries, or of energy-harvesting; and by their use of regulators. This report specifically focuses on energy harvesting, hence the forecasts begin at the “served-available-market” level, not the total available market. In the latter category, we would include wired sensor networks and applications that designers would not consider as good opportunities for energy-harvesting or portable power-management devices. We filtered all the applications that we looked at on this occasion with energyharvesting opportunities in mind.

Any company that makes products for portable devices is eligible to benefit from this market opportunity. Many semiconductor companies, for instance, are already making ICs that could fit this space, or they could modify an existing product line. Cell phones, laptops, PDAs and similar devices are evolving in a way that is changing existing power architectures, giving energy-harvesting technologies an immediate resource on which to draw. These opportunities extend not only to power-management ICs, but also energy-storage solutions such as thin-film batteries, micro-generators, capacitors and other emerging technologies.

Cost and manufacturability will be key drivers for the adoption of energy harvesting, particularly for consumer devices. Low cost is very important in residential applications, for instance. Certain technical issues are important, such as getting reasonable power density from energy-harvesting devices. A perceived lack of reliability could also pose a commercial threat.

Energy-harvesting commercial production is already reaching significant volume numbers, but industry observers expect to see hundreds of millions of units within the next two to three years, and billions of units within five years. Semiconductor companies are taking the lead with power-management ICs, and smaller companies, many of which are located in Europe, are following with energy-harvesting modules and systems. Energy-storage companies are introducing new thin-film batteries and micro-generators that work with energy- harvesting solutions.

With potential markets spanning several billion-unit industries, energy harvesting could be “the next big thing” in power. We’ll keep you posted.

Jeff Shepard is president of Darnell Group. You can contact him at jshepard@darnell.com