I recently had the pleasure of meeting with the folks from Torex Semiconductor, a company that's pretty well known in certain parts of Asia for its high-efficiency, low-noise analog products. They're working to make a name for themselves in the US.

We discussed a bunch of their latest products, and I discovered one of the interesting features is in the packaging of its parts. The company's ultra-small package, or USP, can be a differentiator. The USP is a resin-sealed, leadless, surface-mount package that uses electroform transfer leads rather than traditional leads that require an expensive mold. In addition, changes to the lead shape can be handled more easily, as well as modifications to the package to match the chip and functional objective. This includes the size, shape, and number of pins.

The package can support multi-chip, bump chip, and stacked-chip packaging. Compared to conventional surface mount packages, the USP is smaller, lower profile, and offers better heat dissipation because it exposes the back surface leads. Note that a sufficient pin bonding strength is maintained by adding a pin lead overhang that hooks on to the resin.

That said, Torex recently came out with its XC8107/XC8108 series of power switches that offer an 85-mΩ on resistance. The switches are suited for USB 2.0 and 3.0 applications, as well as power line distribution applications.

The XC8107 series includes an over-current limiting function with an accuracy of plus or minus 10 percent. The XC8108 series has a variable current limiting function that can be set from 0.9A to 2.4A using an external resistor. The input voltage range is 2.5V to 5.5V and the supply current is 40 muA (Vin is 5.0V).

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