Operating and manufacturing a DC-DC converter

摘要

Manufacturing a DC-DC converter on a chip includes: providing a die having a p-type top side and an n-type bottom side; removing an interior portion, creating a hole; flipping the interior portion; inserting the interior portion into the hole; fabricating high-side switch cells in the interior portion's top side and low-side switch cells in the exterior portion's top side; sputtering a magnetic material on the entire top side; burrowing tunnels into the magnetic material; and applying conductive material on the magnetic material and within the tunnels, electrically coupling pairs of high-side and low-side switches, with each pair forming a micro-power-switching phase, where the conductive material forms an output node of the phase, and the conductive material in the burrowed tunnels forms, in each phase, a torodial inductor with a single loop coil and, for the plurality of phases, a directly coupled inductor.

主权项

1. A method of operating a DC (‘Direct Current’)-DC converter on a chip, the chip comprising:
a semiconductor die comprising a first portion and second portion, the first portion surrounding the second portion, the first portion comprising a p-type top side and an n-type bottom side, the second portion comprising an n-type top side and a p-type bottom side; a plurality of micro-power-switching phases comprising magnetic material, with each phase comprising: a high-side switch with a control input for activating the high-side switch, the high-side switch implemented in a cell of the n-type top side of the second portion of the semiconductor die; a low-side switch with a control input for activating the low-side switch, the low-side switch implemented in a cell of the p-type top side of the first portion of the semiconductor die; and an output node, the high-side switch and low-side switch electrically coupled to the output node through the magnetic material, wherein: the output node of each phase extrudes through the magnetic material to form, in each phase, a torodial inductor with a single loop coil, and to form, for the plurality of phases, a directly coupled inductor; the output node of each micro-power-switching phase is coupled to a filter and a load; each high-side switch is configured, when activated, to couple a voltage source to the phase's single loop coil; and the low-side switch of each phase is configured, when activated, to couple the phase's single loop coil to a ground voltage; and the method comprising: alternatively activating each switch, wherein no two switches of any phase are activated at the same time.