ALT, Inc. Introduces High-Efficiency Monolithic LED Driver Technology

Advanced Lighting Technologies, Inc. (ALT) announced the achievement of a high-efficiency and highly reliable LED lamp driver solution (LED driver) comprising no bulky, unreliable components such as capacitors, coils or EMI filters. According to the company, unlike the few other companies announcing similar products, ALT’s target is to offer an ultra reliable "AC LED Light Engine" comprising only an LED array and a tiny 8 pin or 16 pin chip, requiring no other parts except two wires to connect to the ac outlet. The ALT LED driver is fully compatible with all dimmers, is over 90% efficient and has a power factor greater than 0.95.

Working printed-circuit board prototypes demonstrate proof of concept and the technology. Because there are no reactive parts in the ALT driver circuit, the entire LED driver can be reduced to a single ASIC chip or be embedded as an IP block in a customer-specific system-on-a-chip.

Wayne Steinhoff, ALT’s CEO, states, "Combining the ALT single chip driver with an LED array creates the ’Ultimate Lighting Device’, an electric light completely made of solid state components that can be manufactured in large volumes completely by automated equipment. ALT has working prototypes to prove the concept, and ALT is looking to partner with semiconductor companies and lighting companies to bring this revolutionary technology to market." The ALT driver is designed for an extremely wide range of output power (1W-300W) and ambient temperature (-50 to 150°C). The technology is protected by a broad "frontier" pending patent executed by an experienced inventor, Beniamin Acatrinei, who originally conceived of the novel constant voltage constant current (CVCC) driver topology during the 1995 – 1997 time period when he obtained his first US patent.

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