EX - An Advanced Gate Driver for a High-Power Inverter based on Hybrid Switch SiC+IGBT technology.

SiC technology in high power inverters is now broadly adopted. The key benefits of SiC technology are better efficiency, higher power density, and lower overall system cost for applications where the investment in the efficiency gain results in cost savings for other parts of the system. Application examples include battery-operated systems, such as Electronic Vehicles (EVs), where the efficiency gain leads to a battery size reduction, compensating for the additional cost of adopting SiC technology and resulting in an overall reduction in the system cost.

However, as SiC technology represents one of the most expensive parts in a high-power inverter system, there is a lot of focus to cost optimize power systems solutions by using alternatives such as Si based IGBTs.

This presentation will focus on an implementation of a hybrid switch concept for high power inverters combining both IGBT and SiC technology to achieve a better cost-efficiency compromise thanks to the optimized gate driver designed for a hybrid switch in High-Power Motor Control Inverters.