Improved power management for hybrid vehicles

Fuji Electric and Furukawa Electric are working on a power chip for hybrids that does not involve the use of silicon.

The power chip in a hybrid vehicle controls the efficiency of the battery use, and is currently limited by the use of silicon in such chips.

By combining Furukawa's expertise in gallium nitride production, and Fuji's skills in power management chips (Fuji currently supplies such chips for hybrid vehicles), the 30 engineers working on the project hope to produce a product by the end of FY2011 which will provide 10% more mileage for a given battery than is currently possible.

Other uses for such a chip include data center servers, notorious gluttons for power.

Shares in both Furukawa and Fuji rose sharply this morning (06/22/09) as a result of this announcement.