Renesas Electronics Launches Driver for LED Support

Renesas Electronics America Inc., a provider of microcontrollers, advanced semiconductor solutions such as SoC solutions, and a wide range of analog and power devices, has launched its R2A20134 LED driver IC that supports Light Emitting Diode (LED) lighting applications in a cheaper and power-efficient manner.

As the LED lighting is quickly displacing the incandescent light bulbs throughout the world, the market scale of the LED lighting field is expected to grow substantially. LEDs are powered by direct current drive, which makes the conversion of commercial alternating current (AC) power supply to direct current (DC) mandatory. To fulfill the ever increasing need of AC-DC conversion circuits, various control methods for LED lighting drivers are being introduced by a range of companies. Renesas Electronics has leveraged exclusive voltage step-down control technology in development of its new R2A20134 LED driver IC.

The new R2A20134 LED driver IC features a voltage step-down control technology that offers a high line-to-ground voltage and also enables the users to choose low-voltage MOSFETs that are relatively cheaper. Deploying its exclusive high-voltage control and critical-conduction mode, Renesas Electronics allows zero-current switching at turn-on and switching in a low drain-source voltage state through the new IC, which helps in reduction of power loss during switching.

Enterprises can change the configuration of the externally connected elements to offer support for various LED control modes, some of which are buck-boost control, average-current control, peak-current control and constant-input-power control. Additionally, they can deploy the R2A20134 LED driver IC by Renesas Electronics in TRIAC dimmer applications by applying a voltage matched to the TRIAC phase to the FB pin for constant-current control. Renesas Electronics also provides a number of drive MOSFETs to fulfill varying power and performance requirements. The company will provide samples of its new LED driver IC at the price of $1 per unit, and will begin mass production of the components in March 2011.

Earlier this month, Renesas Electronics Corporation introduced three new audio decoder Systems on Chips. The new devices, named µPD63530, µPD63910 and µPD63911, feature an integrated Universal Serial Bus (USB) host controller, out of which the µPD63530 device is available in a 48-pin low-profile quad flat-pack package.