Infineon Technologies has unveiled WLC1115, its latest 15W power transmitter controller IC for wireless charging, at Computex 2022, according to Infineon Taiwan.
Among WLC family ICs, WLC1115 is the first featuring adoption of inductive wireless charging technology. WLC1115 is a highly integrated transmitter controller IC mainly consisting of USB-PD/PPS sink, DC/DC controller, a full bridge inverter, sensing peripherals, configurable flash memory, software that supports Qi v1.3.x standards and proprietary charging protocols. WLC1115 supports a wide range of input voltage from 4.5V to 24V.
WLC1115 comes along with Qi v1.3.2-certified MP A11 power transmitter reference solution for a wide range of wireless power charging including smartphones, smart speakers, docking stations and monitor stands.
According to Infineon's market research, the global market value for wireless charging transmitter controller ICs will increase at a CAGR of 61% during 2022-2027, with consumer application to take up most of demand, said power supply and sensing system executive Derek Chen for Infineon Taiwan.
Fast growing demand for consumer application of wireless power charging is mainly due to great technological improvement in wireless power conversion, with efficiency rising from about 50% in the past to at least 80% at present, Chen said. Consequently, wireless power charging modules have been increasingly adopted for smartphones, Chen noted.
Besides, technology regarding safety of wireless charging is being improved, Chen indicated. Along with evolution from Qi v1.2 to Qi v1.3, the number of testing cases for compliance with safety standards has increased from 120 to 632, Chen said.
Unlike the consumer market segment, wireless charging penetration of automobiles is very low currently and demand for car-use wireless charging will continue to be small in 2022-2023, Chen noted, adding that this is mainly because there is much more concern about safety for automotive application of wireless charging than for consumer application.
