Written by Cláudio Afonso | info@claudio-afonso.com | LinkedIn | Twitter
Onsemi ($ON) announced on Thursday that NIO have chosen its latest VE-Trac Direct SiC power modules for the next-generation electric vehicles. The silicon carbide (SiC)-based power modules enable the vehicles to have longer range, higher efficiency and faster acceleration. The collaboration of the two companies is expediting the commercialization of SiC technologies to bring EVs equipped with advanced semiconductor material to the market, Onsemi said.
Alan S. Zeng, senior vice president at NIO, commented: “From all the solutions we considered, the VE-Trac Direct SiC traction power modules offered the best efficiency during testing, allowing us to extend our New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) range by 4% compared to the current silicon solution. Onsemi convinced us with the high performance and reliability of its products as well as the excellent support from its engineering and management team. We look forward to collaborating with onsemi on bringing more innovative EVs to market for generations to come.”
At the heart of an EV, the main traction inverter converts battery energy into large amounts of torque and acceleration. The VE-Trac Direct SiC is an integrated single side direct cooling (SSDC) power module in a six-pack configuration with a low turn on resistance of 1.7 mohm. This platform implements the second generation SiC MOSFET technology from onsemito achieve new levels of performance, efficiency, and quality while sharing a compatible package footprint with its IGBT predecessor. An integrated pin fin baseplate enables direct liquid cooling and easy assembly which allows maximum power output and more efficient thermal dissipation.
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The VE-Trac offerings, including previously introduced VE-Trac Dual and VE-Trac Direct platforms, are available in silicon-based IGBT and in SiC with various voltages, and for traction inverter power ranging from 100 to 250 kW. With its standardized mechanical footprints and expanded power ratings, the VE-Trac product family is designed to effortlessly scale EV power outputs, accelerating the adoption of hybrid and battery EVs (BEV).
“This design collaboration is the culmination of substantial efforts onsemi has put into developing the right technologies for emerging applications such as smart EVs,” said Simon Keeton, executive vice president and general manager of Power Solutions Group at onsemi. “onsemi is the only supplier of silicon carbide solutions with vertical integration capability including SiC boule growth, substrate, epitaxy, device fabrication, best-in-class integrated modules and discrete package solutions. We are rapidly expanding our SiC capacity and are uniquely positioned to address the growing EV market with supply assurance, performance, quality and tailored SiC end solutions.”
The Bavarian business promotion agency “Invest in Bavaria” held an event counting with the presence of many companies developing its business in the region. NIO Europe Vice-President Hui Zhang was representing the EV maker and mentioned the relationship between the region and NIO:
“NIO and Bavaria, it’s a perfect match. We’ve been in Munich since 2016 and this year sees our new design headquarters open in the north of the Bavarian capital! Very soon, we’ll be rolling out our vehicles and game-changing Power Swap Stations and Battery-as-a-Service (BaaS) in Germany. It’s a hugely exciting time”, Hui Zhang started to say.
Earlier this week, NIO announced that it expects its Class A ordinary shares to be listed and commence trading on the Main Board of the Singapore Exchange Securities Trading Limited (the “SGX-ST”) on May 20, 2022.
Written by Cláudio Afonso | info@claudio-afonso.com | LinkedIn | Twitter
