Revolutionary innovations in power discrete devices

During the last five years, revolutionary advances in power semiconductor devices have occurred. At the start of this decade, discrete power devices consisted of bipolar devices such as the thyristor and bipolar junction transistor, and unipolar devices such as the power MOSFET and JFET. The recent merger of these technologies to create a new class of devices--the MOS-bipolar family--has been responsible for a resurgence in power electronics because these devices operate at a high current density leading to a low chip cost and because they can be controlled by using low cost integrated drive circuitry. This paper reviews the progress in MOS-bipolar discrete device technology. Trends in cell design and power handling capability are provided as a guide to forecasting technological advances.