Three passive devices: resistance, capacitance and inductance, are the basic passive components that any hardware circuit cannot be separated from. These passive components exist in various application fields. Their existence is not only related to the overall stability of hardware circuits, but also determines the overall quality of electronic equipment.
Among them, inductance is the general name of mutual inductance and self-inductance, and it is the basic physical quantity in closed circuit. Inductor is composed of winding, magnetic core and other raw materials. It is a component that can convert electric energy into magnetic energy and memory it by using inductance characteristics, and is also called choke. With the development of inductors towards low voltage, large DC bias, high temperature stability, miniaturization and thinning, ordinary soft magnetic ferrite materials can no longer meet such high requirements, and integrated forming inductors have become popular.
Rapid iteration of electronic products promotes the development of integrated forming inductor
Nowadays, the kinds of consumer electronic equipment, industrial electronic equipment and automobile electronic equipment all show the trend of miniaturization, integration, multifunction and high power. There are many applications of inductors in such devices. In order to meet the development trend of electronic devices, inductors need to be continuously improved in volume, power, cost and performance. Traditional inductors, such as plug-in inductors and wound inductors, have begun to be weak, so integrated inductors came into being and quickly be a hotshot in various inductor applications.
Integrated forming inductor
Integrated forming inductor is an upgraded version of wound inductor, which is die-cast by implanting air-core coil into mold and filling magnetic powder. It also has many nicknames, such as molding compression inductor and alloy inductor. Integrated forming inductor has three characteristics, one is SMD or DIP, the other is that the integrated forming structure has low noise characteristics, and the third is that the integrate forming structure has the lowest DC impedance compared with other structures under the same size.
Specifically, the integrated forming inductor structure is more stable, has lower impedance, and higher efficiency than traditional inductors, and can maintain excellent Itemp and Isat characteristics in high frequency and high temperature environment. This kind of integrated forming inductor has a wide range of applications, from mobile digital equipment to communication equipment, from industrial control equipment to automotive electronic equipment, it is necessary to use integrated inductor to improve the performance of power link.
The consumer electronics market is a big market for integrated inductors. Especially, the multi-functional design space of many intelligent terminals is very tight, and the PCB space is more and more limited. Miniaturized integrated forming inductors with excellent performance naturally become the first choice for these devices. Although mobile communication equipment is the largest downstream market of integrated forming inductors, integrated forming inductors for medical aviation, automobile and industry have higher value, especially automobile integrated forming inductors, which have high plus value and much higher price than the average price of inductors in the field of mobile communication.
Continuously growing market size and penetration rate of integrated forming inductor
Under the leadership of aviation medical care, automobile and industrial applications, the market scale of inductors continues to grow. It is estimated that the global inductor market will exceed 6 billion US dollars in 2024. The penetration rate of integrated forming inductors in inductor applications is also increasing continuously. According to the statistics of China Electronic Components Industry Association, it is estimated that 70% of power inductors adopt integrated forming technology by the end of 2022. The global market scale of integrated power inductors alone will reach 22.6 billion yuan, and the domestic market scale will exceed 10 billion yuan. The driving force of its market scale growth mainly comes from automotive electronics, 5G, Internet of Things, intelligence wearable devices and so on.
Integrated forming inductor
The integrated forming inductor meets the needs of miniaturization and intelligence of electronic equipment. Compared with the traditional wound inductor, it is not only fully competent in technical indicators, but also improves the assembly efficiency of downstream products. Its only disadvantage is that its price is on the high side. In the future, it will gradually replace the traditional wound inductor in most fields and continue to improve its penetration rate.
From the perspective of industry structure, the technical threshold of integrated inductor is high, and manufacturers who can stably prepare integrated inductor have strong competitiveness in the market. At present, four companies, namely Vishay Intertechnology, Inc in the United States, Murata in Japan, Cyntec in Taiwan and Chilisin, occupy more than 80% of the market share of integrated forming inductors, and are the first echelon of the current market, among which Vishay has obvious advantages. Domestic manufacturers such as Sunlord, Microgate and Fenghua Advanced Technology are also continuously increasing investment in R&D, while vigorously promoting the application of related customers, and their market space and future prospects are promising.
Progress of Integrated forming Inductance Manufacturers
On the integrated forming inductance technical route, American Vishay has made many breakthroughs, and its patented technology is basically mastered. Vishay's integrated molding process can handle high transient current spikes without hard saturation, which is absolutely leading in technology. Its integrated inductor has a large market in high-end fields such as automobile and industry. At present, Vishay continuously optimizes the voltage regulation module and DCDC conversion of high-end electronic equipment on the integrated inductor.
IHLP Series, Vishay
At present, the famous IHLP series integrated forming inductance owned by Vishay have 189 kinds of subdivision materials in official website, including commercial grade and automotive grade, which are specifically divided into original series, low DCR series, high temperature series and ultra-high temperature series. IHLP series of integrated forming inductance have been improved in size, DC resistance and current capability, and buzzer noise can be reduced to the lowest level in the industry.
The power inductor products of Murata, another leading manufacturer, can be divided into integrally formed inductors and ferrite inductors. Winding wires, metal alloy materials and electrodes are mainly used. Winding wires are integrally formed into electrodes by metal alloy materials, and then unique material technology, winding technology and forming technology are used to commercialize integrally formed inductors. As far as its own products are concerned, the integrated forming inductance is about 50% smaller in size than ferrooxide materials. Murata's DFE series integrated forming inductance also have more than 100 material numbers currently being mass-produced. The optimized materials and coil structure have achieved ultra-high electrical characteristics in small size, and through the technology with both withstand voltage and reliability, they are fully competitive in automotive grade products.
As a domestic passive component head manufacturer, Sunlord has also laid out integrated forming inductance. According to relevant information, Sunlord has laid out integrated forming inductance with large-size, small-size models and WTX product types. Its integrated forming inductance has extremely low DCR and ultra-low AC loss with high switching frequency (up to 5MHz), and also reduces magnetic leakage flux and electromagnetic interference through closed magnetic circuit design.
WTX Series, Sunlord Electronics
Sunlord is currently vigorously promoting the batch sales application of integrated inductors in mobile phone applications, automotive electronics applications, industrial control applications and Internet of Things modules; Fenghua Advanced Technology, as a domestic manufacturer of head passive components, has not only made frequent progress in the field of high-end capacitors and resistors, but also realized mass production of miniature integrated inductors in the field of integrated inductors, and continued to open up markets in the fields of automotive electronics and high-end communication.
Microgate has also been deployed in the field of integrated inductors for a long time, with small-size MPIM series, and has been supplied stably and on a large scale in the field of mobile phones and laptops in China. In the field of automotive electronics, according to relevant news, its integrated inductor has been designated among many automotive electronics customers, and it is expected to expand more application markets in the future.
Integrated inductor, Microgate
The technical barrier of integrated forming inductance is still the biggest obstacle faced by related manufacturers, and the two barriers of material formula and manufacturing process directly affect the performance and stability of integrated forming inductance. The finished products made of different material ratios are quite different in permeability, loss rate, frequency, magnetic saturation and other parameters. Currently, it still relies on imports.
At present, the upgrading frequency of the downstream terminal market is accelerating, and the related designs of downstream manufacturers need the integrated inductor manufacturers to make customized cooperation, which gives non-head manufacturers many opportunities. Many domestic manufacturers who have broken through the manufacturing technology of integrated forming inductance have started close cooperation with downstream manufacturers. With the deep cooperation of local customization and cost advantages, it is expected to open up the market development space of domestic integrated inductors in automobile, industrial control and high-end consumer equipment.
The Penetration Rate of Integrate Forming Inductance Continues to Increase, which is Expected Break into Domestic Market-China exportsemi.com
