Introduction to Our E-Mobility Solutions

Why the Automotive Future is Electric

Electric Vehicles (EVs) are the automotive industry’s most recent development, creating a lot of buzz around their future. With more opportunities and plenty of challenges to handle, businesses around the world are excited to take their own part in the rise of these vehicles.

Microchip has a strong history of success in the automotive space. In this blog post, we will look at how the shift toward EVs and eMobility applications affects us.

First, we need to understand the impact the automotive industry has on Microchip. About 15% of our revenue comes from the automotive industry, making it our third-largest source. That means the automotive sector is significant to almost all our product lines.

About 90% of the applications going into an EV are the same as traditional gasoline-powered vehicles—things like doors, windows, power steering, pumps/fans and touchscreens. The other 10% is inviting change and innovation for the industry. For example, engines are being swapped for electric motors and gas tanks are replaced with batteries.

EVs are the next logical step in a long history of evolution for electronics in cars.

So, what are the new application challenges Microchip is focused on solving in EV designs?

Challenges in Vehicle Electrification

Many consumers struggle with the shift from how a traditional gas-powered vehicle works to how an EV works. One of the biggest concerns is the range. How far can you go before you have to recharge? Much of the focus in EVs is in increasing the efficiency and reducing power consumption to allow you to go farther on a single charge.

Charging time is continually improving. The benchmark for many manufacturers now is 20 miles for every minute spent charging. However, in the future, the goal is for it to take the same amount of time that a gasoline-powered vehicle spends refueling.

As we add more electronic components to these vehicles, we add software as well, requiring massive amounts of code in each vehicle. Functional safety has been put into place to be sure that the software is functioning properly without dangerous glitches. If something goes wrong, this allows it to go wrong as safely as possible.

The challenge with the most unknowns is the overall infrastructure to make this all happen. If EVs become the majority, we currently do not have good models in place. There are many questions around the accommodations needed for chargers as well as the increase in electricity usage. There are still a lot of things to be discussed going forward.

How EV Systems Differ From a Traditional Car

The most obvious difference between an EV and a traditional gas-powered car is the electric motor. Additionally, there is no need for a transmission and other pieces of equipment.

Some vehicles capture energy when you decelerate or hit the brakes to help charge the battery. Although initially introduced in hybrid vehicles, this capability allows EVs to have a greater range when driving in the city, where braking is more constant.

Designers deal with so many different power levels, from 200–800V (high voltage) for the motor, power steering and air conditioning compressors to low voltage (12/48V) for things like headlights, interior lights, wipers, window motors and fans. You want to have the highest voltages possible to have less current to avoid using too much wiring, thus requiring less copper and less weight being added to the vehicle. However, anything that people are dealing with should be lower voltage to avoid electrocution. This is all possible with a DC/DC converter.

When it comes to charging the car’s battery, we look at On-Board Charging (OBC), Battery Management Systems (BMSs), current sensors and EV charging stations. These are all things that replace a traditional gas tank. The BMS is the brains of the structure, allocating energy to the rest of the vehicle when you drive.

There are also a few unintended consequences when switching to EVs. One drawback to electrification is there is less heat to harness for in-cabin heating. There is a tradeoff here between temperature comfort and the range of the battery. Therefore, the batteries will have lower efficiency particularly in winter when these are being used as heaters. This differs from the heat we get off the engine in a gasoline vehicle.

Another unintentional effect is the need for artificial sound for safety, as pedestrians have gotten used to car noises. EVs are very quiet, differing from the engine noises we have conditioned ourselves to look out for in parking lots and on the road. As such, an Acoustic Vehicle Alerting System (AVAS) is now being implemented in EVs, as many governments are mandating these vehicles to emit an audible tone when traveling at lower speeds to alert any pedestrians of their presence.

Solutions Overview for Electric Vehicles

With all these new demands, what products does Microchip have to help solve these new design challenges? We offer several solutions for these EV projects.

Microcontrollers (MCUs) and Digital Signal Controllers (DSCs) offer all the control functions for digital power conversion, motor control, advanced sensing, ISO 26262 functional safety and security. They are available as single core or dual core.

Our broad portfolio of analog devices offers capabilities for analog-to-digital converters, temperature sensing, operational amplifiers, power management integrated circuits, clock solutions, gate drivers and voltage regulators to provide the signal processing.

Silicon Carbide (SiC) offers a large impact on EVs. SiC is often discussed as a good fit for EV applications. It brings three key attributes to an EV. The first is high voltage, which is needed for higher efficiency. Another is ruggedness—SiC is reliable, it lasts longer and it works well in a wide range of climates. The third feature is switching frequency for achieving high efficiency.

Our inductive sensors are designed for an automotive environment. They are a cost-effective solution that provides fast and precise position acquisition. They also offer rotary and linear position solutions. Overall, these sensors are well suited for vehicles.

In-vehicle networking remains an important feature in all vehicles, both traditional and electric. Moving forward, CAN/CAN-FD, Local Interconnect Network (LIN), Ethernet, USB and Bluetooth® LE may all be included in EVs, giving Microchip plenty of opportunities to provide our solutions for these requirements.

Due to the mass amounts of code required for functional safety in EVs, security will require lots of attention as we add more intelligence to our vehicles. Secure boot, secure firmware upgrade and authentication, hardware cryptographic accelerators and secure key storage are some of the security use cases and features we offer under our security products.

Watch our stream to get an overview on eMobility. Watch the Transportation Innovation Days webinar sessions on demand or by registering for an event. To learn about automotive products and solutions, visit our automotive solutions page.