New Industry Products

Toshiba Launches High-Current Chipset for Free Positioning Wireless Charging

December 10, 2012 by Jeff Shepard

Toshiba Electronics Europe has announced a free positioning wireless charging chipset consisting of a high-efficiency power transmitter and receiver for charging smartphones and other mobile products anywhere on the battery charging pad. The Toshiba chipset is fully compliant with the Wireless Power Consortium (WPC) Qi interface specification, A4, A8, A12 and A14. It includes the TB6865FG power transmitter and TB6860WBG receiver and features a two-coil control architecture for cost-effective battery charging.

The position of a mobile device is detected by the TB6865FG and only one of the coils is energized for charging, thereby preserving efficiency and allowing product freedom of placement. As a result, end users can place a Qi-capable mobile product on a Qi compliant charging surface and achieve up to 74 percent better efficiency across a majority1 of the charging area. In addition, the design flexibility of the TB6865FG allows the control of two coils, so two mobile products can be charged simultaneously.

Toshiba's new chipset is built with the company's microcontroller and analogue IC technology and features high levels of integration to reduce component count, board space and cost in wireless charging applications. The TB6865FG transmitter integrates both microcontroller and analogue elements including PWM circuitry, switching control, on-board filter and a pre-driver circuit. The TB6860WBG receiver combines modulation and control circuitry with a rectifier power pickup, built-in high-performance DC-DC buck converter and protection functions.

The TB6860WBG offers a programmable charging profile via I2C control. The latter provides an integrated DC-DC converter for high-efficiency, high-current charging with a charge current of up to 1.2A. Integrated protection for the receiver IC covers input voltage, output current, over-temperature conditions and metal detection. The TB6865FG is supplied in a LQFP100 14mm x 14mm package while the TB6860WBG is supplied as a WCSP39 4.29mm x 2.69mm device.

Toshiba has been a member of the WPC since it joined the consortium in 2011. In addition to wireless charging solutions built around inductive coupling, the company is also actively involved in research to develop commercial solutions that extend charging distances through the use of resonance coupling.