New Industry Products

TI Debuts the bq2023 Battery Monitor IC

May 16, 1999 by Jeff Shepard

Texas Instruments Inc. (TI, Dallas, TX) has announced the new bq2023, a high-performance battery monitor IC for lithium-ion and lithium-polymer-based applications. The device is designed to measure critical parameters in a battery pack, such as charge, discharge, self-discharge and temperature. It employs an auto-calibrating voltage-to-frequency converter (VFC) for continuous charge/discharge integration. With information from the measurement IC, a host system can calculate remaining battery capacity and predict remaining system run or standby times.

TI's bq2023 battery monitor communicates measurement information to the host controller using the SDQ serial interface. The part also includes 224 bytes of FLASH memory and a 64-bit ID ROM register. The non-volatile memory integration allows a system designer to add a fuel gauge to a system while replacing serial EEPROMs or ID chips. The device is suitable for use in cellular handsets, Internet audio appliances, digital cameras, PDAs and other portable equipment.

The bq2023 features a 25 milliohm sense resistor. Its VFC automatically calibrates measurement offset once per hour to reduce the offset error to 3µV and ensure accurate battery monitoring over voltage and temperature variations. Other features include low voltage operation (2.4V), ultra-low sleep (1.5µA) and operating current, and a programmable output port. In addition, the bq2023 has an internal temperature sensor with 0.25 degree K resolution, which eliminates the need for a thermistor in the battery pack.

The bq2023 is currently available. It is packaged in an eight-pin TSSOP and has a suggested resale price of $1.85 each in quantities of 1,000.