Qualcomm Incorporated

Monolithic Power Systems, Inc.

Christian Gregory Sporck

Shadi Hawawini

Thomas J O'Brien

Georgios Konstantinos Paparrizos

Rui Wang

Min Xu

Giovanni Garcea

Hector Ivan Oporta

Shashank Prakash Mane

Chunping Song

Aaron Melgar

Steve Hawley

VaraPrasad Arikatla

Seema Kumar

Bang Sup Lee

Todd Robert Sutton

Nir Gerber

Joseph Maalouf

Sumukh Shevde

Cheong Kun

Paolo Baruzzi

Arnon Sattinger

Neal L Horovitz

Curtis Gong

Juha Oikarinen

Rashed Hoque

David Wong

Giuseppe Pinto

Craig Aiken

Amit Mano

Guanghui Li

Daryl Bergstrom

Yuncong Jiang

Varaprasad Arikatla

Thomas O'brien

Thomas O'BRIEN

Thomas J O'BRIEN

A battery charge current management system used for charging battery packs. The battery charge current management system has a voltage converting circuit and at least one switch module. The voltage converting circuit can operate at a charge mode or a discharge mode. The voltage converting circuit can serve to provide a master charge current signal to supply a system load and charge battery packs when it operates at the charge mode. The voltage converting circuit further controls the at least one switch module to provide at least one additional charge current signal to supply the system load and charge battery packs.

Battery charge current management system and related integrated circuit

A battery discharge current management system used for discharging battery packs. The battery discharge current management system has a voltage converting circuit and at least one switch module. The voltage converting circuit can operate at a charge mode or a discharge mode. The voltage converting circuit can serve to discharge battery packs so as to provide a master discharge current signal to other devices when it operates at the discharge mode. The voltage converting circuit further controls the at least one switch module to discharge the battery packs so as to provide at least one additional discharge current signal.

Battery discharge current management system with fast discharging function and related integrated circuit

An electric system has an input terminal to receive an input voltage, a system output terminal to provide a system voltage, and N charging units for charging N loads respectively. The electric system has an input switch coupled between the input terminal and a first terminal, a switching circuit coupled between the first terminal and the system output terminal. The switching circuit converts the a boost output voltage at the first terminal to the system voltage, or converts the system voltage to the boost output voltage. The electric system further has a voltage control module having N input terminals coupled to the N charging units respectively, the voltage control module senses N charging currents passing through the N charging units respectively, and adjusts the boost output voltage based on the N charging currents.

Bi-directional battery charging circuit with voltage regulation control

A multi-port battery charge and discharge system used for battery pack charge and discharge. The multi-port battery charge and discharge system has a plurality of voltage converting circuits, each of which can operate in a charge mode to supply load and charge a battery pack or in a discharge mode to supply power sinks. The multi-port battery charge and discharge system further has at least one switch module providing an additional current signal to charge the battery pack.

Multi-port battery charge and discharge system

A Universal Serial Bus (USB) Type-C and power delivery port with scalable power architecture is disclosed. In one aspect, at least two circuits for a USB port are consolidated into a single integrated circuit (IC). At least one of the at least two circuits is part of a Type-C port controller (TCPC) group of circuits including sensors associated with detecting whether a voltage and current are present at pins of a USB receptacle. At least the other one of the at least two circuits is selected from a battery-related group of circuits including a battery charging circuit, an over-voltage protection circuit, and a conditioning circuit. The more circuitry integrated into the single IC the more readily scalable the end product is for a multi-port device. Additional circuitry such as a light emitting diode (LED) driver may also be included in the single IC.

Universal serial bus (USB) type-c and power delivery port with scalable power architecture

Universal serial bus (USB) type-C and power delivery port with scalable power architecture

A multi-port battery charge and discharge system used in the charge and discharge battery pack application. The multi-port battery charge and discharge system has N voltage converting circuits, each of which can operate in a charge mode to charge a battery pack or in a discharge mode to supply power sinks. The N voltage converting circuits can be operated in a master-slave configuration with one of the N voltage converting circuits set as a master voltage converting circuit and the remained ones set as slave voltage converting circuits. In a charge state, the master voltage converting circuit provides a regulated current signal to charge the battery pack, and the slave voltage converting circuits provide slave current signals to complementally charge the battery pack.

Universal Serial Bus (USB) cable type detection and control techniques are disclosed. In an exemplary aspect, a device connected to a cable detects whether the cable is a legacy cable (i.e., a Type-A to Type-C cable). If the cable is a legacy cable, the device determines an appropriate current to draw based on whether the cable is compliant with the USB Type-C specification or non-compliant. Additional exemplary aspects of the present disclosure determine whether a connector adaptor has been put on a legacy cable and determines an appropriate current to draw based on the capabilities of the legacy cable. Still further aspects of the present disclosure evaluate not only the cable to see if the cable limits the current draw, but also evaluate a device at a distal end of the cable to verify if and how current may be drawn by such remote device from a mobile terminal.

Universal serial bus (USB) cable type detection and control techniques

Systems and methods for reuse of battery pack-side current and voltage sensing are disclosed. By reusing elements within a battery pack, a battery field effect transistor (FET) within a power management integrated circuit (PMIC) may be eliminated or at least bypassed. In a first aspect, a current mirror is coupled to a charge protection circuit in the battery pack to capture a sensed current. Likewise, a voltage sensor captures a voltage level for a charging path. Current and voltage are output to the PMIC for use in regulating a buck charger. In a second aspect, current data and voltage data are collected and digitized before being sent to the PMIC for use in regulating the buck charger.

Systems and methods for reuse of battery pack-side current and voltage sensing

Systems and methods for port management are disclosed. In one aspect, the system may consolidate port management functions as well as power conversion, protection features, and signal conditioning circuitry into a single integrated circuit (IC) for a device without a battery. Further exemplary aspects allow for arbitration between ports to handle power supply versus power sink functions. Still further exemplary aspects provide an indication when a weak power source is coupled to the computing device to alert a user that the weak power source may not provide sufficient power for full operation. Such consolidated functionality allows a single form factor to be used for all ports whether the ports are used as a power port or an output port. Further, such consolidated functionality helps mitigate possible damage caused by improper activity.

Systems and methods for port management

Over-voltage protection systems and methods are disclosed. In one aspect, a biasing circuit is added to a pre-existing clamp required by the Universal Serial Bus (USB) Type-C specification at a configuration control (CC) pin. The biasing circuit turns the pre-existing clamp into an adjustable clamp that dynamically adjusts to over-voltage conditions. In an exemplary aspect, the biasing circuit may include a biasing field effect transistor (FET) and a pair of switches that selectively couple the pre-existing clamp and the biasing FET to fixed voltages such that the CC pin is maintained at an acceptable voltage. In another exemplary aspect, the biasing circuit may omit the biasing FET and rely on two switches that selectively couple the pre-existing clamp to fixed voltages such that the CC pin is maintained at an acceptable voltage.

Over-voltage protection systems and methods

The present disclosure includes a method of charging a battery. In one embodiment, the method comprises receiving, in a battery charging circuit on an electronic device, an input voltage having a first voltage value from an external power source. The battery charger is configured to produce a charge current having a first current value into the battery. The input current limit and/or duty cycle of the charger is monitored. Control signals may be generated to increase the first voltage value of the input voltage if either (i) the input current limit is activated or (ii) the duty cycle reaches a maximum duty cycle. The charger also receives signals indicating a temperature inside the electronic device and generates control signals to decrease the value of the input voltage when the temperature increases above a threshold temperature.

Systems and methods for charging a battery

Certain aspects of the present disclosure relate to methods and apparatus for limiting the power drawn by a battery charger based on monitoring of the input voltage and input current supplied to the battery charger from a power supply. In certain aspects, a method generally includes sensing an output voltage of the power supply, wherein the output voltage of the power supply is variable. The method further includes sensing an output current of the power supply. The method further includes providing the output voltage and output current to a battery charger. The method further includes generating a control signal indicative of a scaling of the output current based on a scaling factor, wherein the scaling factor is based on the output voltage. The method further includes providing the control signal to the battery charger to control the output current supplied by the power supply to the battery charger.

Battery charger power control

A configurable charge converter may include an adaptive low-dropout regulator. The adaptive low-dropout regulator may include a headroom detection circuit and a power supply controller. The headroom detection circuit may monitor a voltage drop across a field effect transistor (FET) and cause a programmable power supply to increase or decrease an output voltage accordingly. In some aspects, the configurable charge converter may include an adaptive low-dropout regulator and a buck/boost converter. The output power of the configurable charge controller may be provided by the adaptive low-dropout regulator, the buck/boost converter, or by both the adaptive low-dropout regulator and the buck/boost converter operating in combination.

Configurable charge controller

Systems, methods, and apparatus for testing devices adapted for connection to other devices using universal serial bus (USB) are disclosed. Devices to be tested are caused to enter a special mode of operation when resistance measured at one or more terminals of a USB Type-C connector have values associated with the special mode of operation. One or more operations of the device are automatically initiated when the resistance coupled to the at least one terminal of the connector has a measured value that matches one of a set of resistance values maintained by the device. The one or more operations may include configuring a power management circuit based on the measured value, and entering a mode of operation that controls startup of at least one processor on the device when the measured value matches a first resistance value.

Growing community of inventors

Campbell, CA, United States of America

Christian Gregory Sporck