News: Suppliers
28 September 2021
Keysight and Taiwan’s National Central University Optical Sciences Center establish wide-bandgap R&D and test lab
Keysight Technologies Inc of Santa Rosa, CA, USA and Taiwan’s National Central University Optical Sciences Center (NCUOSC) have announced a collaboration to improve the design and test validation efficiency of gallium nitride (GaN) and silicon carbide (SiC) applications, accelerating the pace of 5G and electric vehicle (EV) innovation.
Since wide-bandgap (WBG) materials such as GaN and SiC offer rapid switching speeds, low loss and withstand high temperature and voltage characteristics, they are leveraged in consumer power products, fast charging, electric vehicles and rail transit, as well as 5G infrastructures and data-center servers. However, these advantages increase the complexity of design and testing.
NCUOSC successfully used Keysight’s PD1500A Dynamic Power Device Analyzer/Double Pulse Tester (DPT) platform to establish a third-generation WBG semiconductor open laboratory to improve development and testing efficiency. As JEDEC (which develops open standards and publications for the microelectronics industry) continues to define the dynamic testing of WBG devices, standardized tests are starting to emerge. The PD1500A DPT determines the key performance parameters, which match all standards, such as turn-on/off and switching characteristics, dynamic on-resistance, dynamic current and voltage, as well as reverse recovery, gate charge and device output characteristics.
“Keysight is happy to work with NCUOSC to help engineering teams characterize, understand, integrate, deploy and drive innovations for next-generation semiconductor technologies,” says Thomas Goetzl, VP & general manager of Keysight’s Automotive and Energy Solutions business unit.
Reliable and repeatable measurements are critical to accelerating design and validation for new technologies, including wide-bandgap semiconductors, says Keysight. The PD1500A DPT intelligent functions - such as fully automatic parameter extraction software based on IEC and JEDEC standards, loop testing, voltage and current sweep testing, and automatic high-temperature testing - can help to drive future innovations, reckons the firm.
“Keysight’s PD1500A DPT enables NCUOSC to reliably characterize wide-bandgap devices and effectively innovate GaN and SiC applications. Its safety protection, scalable and optional test fixtures deliver the flexibility we needed for future expansions,” comments NCUOSC director professor Yue-Ming Hsin. “In addition to the PD1500A, we also set up the Keysight B1505A/N1265A Power Device Analyzer/Curve Tracer to serve the complete and crucial characterizations of WBG semiconductors. It’s our pleasure to collaborate with Keysight and contribute to the ecosystem of 5G/6G and electric vehicles.”
