Powering the World of Electronics 2025

Further to the success of the last three events, with more than 200 attendees from all corners of the UK, Wurth Electronics are excited to bring you the 2025 edition of Powering the World of Electronics - Power Supply & EMC Design and Optimisation. The day is loaded with a variety of topics, applications, practical demonstrations, simulations and a great opportunity to network.

We are delighted to team up again with Rohde & Schwarz (R&S) who will demonstrate the latest and best in test equipment, scope technology and power measurement techniques.

Rohde & Schwarz products and solutions are in use every day, albeit mostly in the background. Whether in the air, on the ground or at sea, Rohde & Schwarz technology is omnipresent. As a successful designer of current and future cutting-edge technologies in topics such as artificial intelligence (AI), 6G or the protection of critical infrastructures, the company makes a significant contribution.

In addition, we are pleased to announce that the Texas Instruments (TI) will be presenting again at this year’s event, bringing the latest trends, applications and developments in power supply and converter designs.

Texas Instruments are a world leading manufacturer of semiconductor technologies with a wealth of expertise and experience in a wide range of power management ICs and solutions catering for different sectors and applications.

This is a great opportunity to tap into the knowledge of these engineers. The design support they can offer is invaluable to anybody who may be looking at selecting and optimizing their power converter topology, dealing with EMI issues or interested in the practical considerations as part of their product designs.

All attendees will be entered into a raffle for a prize draw. We will top the day by announcing the lucky winner of the Top prize, an RTB2 Oscilloscope from R&S.

We will also be giving away evaluation boards from Texas Instruments and a variety of Wurth Electronics UK demo boards, reference guides and development kits.

Coffees and lunch will be provided at the venue.

Please note that we reserve the right to share attendee information with both Wurth Electronics UK, Rohde & Schwarz and Texas Instruments.

If you have any questions regarding the event, please contact joseph.butterfield@we-online.com.

Presentation Topics

1. Make or break your design; Practical design considerations: Power and Control

We will dive straight into practical design tips, covering component selection, parasitic elements, layout and tracking, the effect of temperature and control techniques based on practical examples from SEPIC, BUCK, BOOST and Flyback topologies. We will have calculations, simulations and a practical LIVE demonstration. We plan to examine single and coupled power inductor behavior with the aim of optimizing efficiency, power density and EMC performance.

The following are some of the topics we aim to cover:

• Coupled Inductors leakage and the SEPIC topology – a marriage made in heaven or hell?
• Primary Side Regulation – How does it work?
• To be or not to be “Saturated”? The good, the bad and the ugly.
• Audible noise
• Investigating temperature effects (Redexpert)
• Voltage rating; Necessary or a gimmick
• The Percolation Effect

2. Oscilloscope Fundamentals for Power Engineers

The Oscilloscope is an indispensable tool for any power engineer. This presentation provides an introduction to oscilloscope operation and essential measurement techniques, specifically tailored for power system analysis. We will learn to confidently capture, interpret, and troubleshoot waveforms in linear and switching power supplies. This session aims to empower engineers with the skills to effectively utilize the oscilloscope for design validation, performance optimisation, and efficient troubleshooting.

3. Designing with DC/DC Converters – hints, tips and gotchas.

TI has a huge range of DC/DC converter devices. In this presentation we will discuss how to select the most appropriate device from the range; we will talk about how to specify the external passives that go around the IC; and we will touch on how to optimise the layout. For each section we will give an overview and dive into some hints, tips and common “gotchas” to be avoided.

4. Thermal management 101

This presentation will cover PCB layout optimisation for maximum heat dissipation, focusing on design strategies and best practices. It explores tools for identifying thermal issues early in the design stage and techniques to enhance conduction, convection, and radiation efficiency. Additionally, it provides insights into ensuring optimal heat transfer from PCB to heatsink. Attendees will gain practical knowledge to improve thermal performance in their designs.

5. Power Modules – Think outside the box demo

A brief overview of the technology, advantages/key features, and range of specifications. This is followed by detailed practical demonstration of our voltage and current regulated modules evaluation boards and reference designs. The current sharing interleaved topology and bench power supply are some of the reference designs we will look at in detail. Here the DC-DC module is used very intelligently with some external components to create a simple bench power supply. Likewise, the current sharing topology uses two of the modules in parallel doubling the output current, we will look at this reference designs and demonstrate them on the day.

6. One stop shop; A Measurement Approach to Practical Design for EMC.

Good EMC design practice by implementing filter design, good layout and tracking, shielding and OVP are key to ruggedising your system against EMI and getting a step closer towards compliance. At the same time, it is important to close the loop by assessing the performance of the system through measurement. The aim of this session is to identify good EMC design through a practical example and demonstrate using a variety of test equipment that you can have in your lab, how to assess the compatibility of your EMI countermeasures. A combination of conducted and radiated emissions measurements will be performed using the MXO series scope, field probes current probe and a TEM cell.

Speakers:

Nick LeBas - Rohde & Schwarz

Nick studied Electronics engineering at Bangor University, graduating in 2018. Started as an EMC Test Engineer for four years in consumer technology compliance, doing emission and immunity testing. Later specialising in RSE testing in the newest radio technologies. Joining Rohde & Schwarz in 2022 now specializing in Oscilloscopes as a Product manager/Application engineer, where he uses his knowledge of test and measurement to support engineers across the UK, Ireland and Benelux.

Dr Jim Perkins – Texas Instruments

Jim is a Senior Member of Technical Staff at Texas Instruments. He joined TI in 2011 as part of the acquisition of National Semiconductor and has been a field application engineer for over 25 years. Jim has been involved in many different markets including automotive and personal electronics. Today he is primarily responsible for supporting the TI analogue and power product portfolio in building automation applications such as fire safety, security and smart home. He specialises in power management and dc/dc point of load power conversion, with particular focus on space and cost constrained applications. Jim graduated from the University of Leeds with a Master of Engineering in electrical and electronic engineering in 1992, and a PhD in InP/InGaAs semiconductor processing in 1996.

Ross Parlour – Texas Instruments

Ross joined Texas Instruments in 2014. Today he is responsible for supporting TI’s product portfolio for Automotive designs, including architecting both LV & HV systems within the vehicle. Ross graduated from the University of Plymouth with a Batchelor of Science in electrical and electronic engineering in 2013. This qualification was achieved part-time, whilst working at the University as a member of the technical staff, focused on RF and Signal Chain since 2006.

Greg Dodd - Wurth Electronics UK

Greg is an Application Engineer at Wurth Elektronics UK with over three years of experience specialising in electromechanical components, design-for-manufacture (DFM), and assembly optimisation. Prior to this, he collaborated with leading clients including ExxonMobil, Shell, and BP, delivering world-class innovations in environmental inspection solutions.

Mohamed Al-Alami - Wurth Electronics UK

Mohamed comes from a power supply design and development background. He worked in the Aerospace Industry for 10 years designing power supplies on various civilian and military projects. In addition, he was responsible for EMC testing, filter design and compliance. In the past 5 years before joining Wurth Electronics UK, he taught a variety of subjects at University towards a BTEC degree in electronics engineering. He joined Wurth in April 2015 as a Field Applications Engineer responsible for the South of the England, Wales and Ireland.

Glen Wallis - Wurth Electronics UK

Glen Wallis, Technical Director with Wurth Electronics UK Ltd has over 30 years of experience in field of EMC product testing, solution providing in addition to EMI component selection. Having started in the EMC industry as an apprentice at a prestigious EMC UK laboratory and working his way up to Senior EMC Test Engineer and Competent Body status during a 14 year career span, giving great experience in commercial, industrial, medical, telecom and aftermarket automotive market sectors. To further his career, he then joined Wurth Electronics in 2007 as a Region Business Manager in the East Anglia region, promoting and designing in EMC and Inductive solutions from the product portfolio. For the last 12 years he has taken a technical lead in the UK, initial as a Field Application Engineer through supporting customers in technical education as well as providing EMC solutions to the UK and international arena. To date, this continues on through the leadership of the UK Application Engineer team.

Ibrahim Chamali - Wurth Electronics UK

Ibrahim studied Electronic engineering at the University of Surrey, after a short stint in R&D at a company that designs high voltage power supplies he then joined Wurth Electronics. For the last 8 years at Wurth, Ibrahim has supported customers as an account manager directly before moving over to the Field Application Engineering role. Always keen to help the customer base by optimising component selection and resolving issues such as EMI are at the forefront of his responsibilities that he enjoys. The power modules are one of his focus products and he is keen to present the range and reference designs at powering the world of electronics 2025.