EL SEGUNDO, CA, August 1996 - In order to significantly increase their focus on battery-operated and wireless equipment, International Rectifier (IR) has established the "Battery Management Group". The charter of this new organization is to deliver advanced power conversion solutions to meet the unique demands of this fast-growing market.

Alex Lidow, CEO at IR explains this new strategic direction for the company, "battery-operated equipment is placing new application-specific demands on the supplier base and, in turn, requires a unique focus to satisfy those needs". He adds, "this market is extremely power conscious. IR has over 20 years experience in helping our customers manage and convert power sources more efficiently. This experience combined with our new organizational focus, puts IR in an excellent position to address the needs of this market".

Gene Sheridan, previously Director of Strategic Marketing for IR's HEXFETr power MOSFET line, will lead the new effort. IR will dedicate resources from all areas within the company which will be required to develop and deliver the needed products. The cross-functional organization will place special emphasis on concurrent engineering particularly between device engineers, system designers and close customer partnerships.

"Consumers are increasing their demands on both power levels and battery life. Higher storage requirements, brighter and better resolution screens, increased wireless communications and data transfer, and higher processing speeds are all driving power levels up", according to Sheridan. "Battery sources are not able to deliver the power while meeting the lifetime demands", he continues, "and focus has increased in the industry on better managing the power".

IR already offers a line-up of surface-mount HEXFETr power MOSFETs and Schottky diodes tailored to battery-operated equipment. These include low-voltage, low-drop devices in the popular SO-8, SMB and SMC along with IR's own Micro series of miniature package outlines. The new Battery Management group will focus on providing total design solutions for all power circuits within battery-operated equipment such as: charging and control, battery protection, battery regulation, power distribution and load management.

Contact the Technical Assistance Center or your local Sales Rep.