Nexperia Battery Life Booster for IoT

[Kean]

I'm unsure about this being dodgy, but the claims bring back awful memories of the Batterizer/Batteroo.

While I have only skim read the info, I suspect this is sufficiently advanced in comparison considering there is an I2C/SPI interface plus super cap integration.

From the product launch announcement email (my emphasis):

Nexperia is excited to announce the launch of the Coin Cell Battery Life Booster ICs. Nexperia has introduced the NBM5100 and NBM7100, revolutionary new types of battery life boosting ICs designed to extend the life of a typical non-rechargeable lithium coin cell battery by up to 10x compared to competing solutions. The ICs also increase peak output current capability by up to 25x compared to what a typical coin cell can deliver without a battery booster. This unrivalled extension in working life will significantly reduce the amount of battery waste in low-power Internet of Things (IoT) and other portable applications while making coin cells a viable power source for applications which could previously only operate from AA- or AAA- batteries.

Landing page: https://www.nexperia.com/products/analog-logic-ics/power-ics/battery-management-ics/
Info leaflet: https://assets.nexperia.com/documents/leaflet/nexperia_document_leaflet_battery_life_booster_NBM5100_NBM7100.pdf

Anyone looked into this?  Even better if you've run the numbers...

[Chalcogenide]

I think that the main idea is that in IoT applications, your product may stop working long before the battery is out of energy, because you may be limited by the capability of your battery to provide enough peak power for the transmission. Internal resistance of coin cell batteries rises rather quickly as energy gets depleted so there can be situations where your peak power cannot be delivered even if the same battery would last a lot longer under a lower load. These chips essentially "smooth out" the peak by supplying the peak power from a capacitor and then slowly charging it from the coin cell while keeping the average current low, thus reducing the strain on the battery.
I think that there are legit use cases for these chips, but I have a hard time believing the 10x battery life improvement, unless in applications where you have a huge peak power and a really poor battery.

[Kean]

Oh yes, agree with you there.  I don't think it is all BS, but the "up to x10" statement may be somewhat... exaggerated??

I saw in the leaflet it says "extending the useful lifetime between replacement by typically 4-10 times".

[Someone]

Not going to try and hunt down what they call a "competing solution" (almost certainly something without a supercap as that is what provides 99% of the functionality here) but there are other manufacturers selling roughly the same thing; an ultra low quiescent current switching regulator with programmable cycle-by-cycle or peak current limit. So I know of several competing solutions which would be almost indistinguishable in performance to this.

Cute integration with a (lossy?) supercap balancer and charge accumulator.

[thm_w]

Anyone know the maximum current draw of BLE? I would have thought its super low.

Kind of odd examples they use: "Consumer/wearable: location tags, heart rate monitor, blood glucose meter"
Heart rate monitors last forever on a single CR2032, 300+ hours.

Would be cool though to see a comparison of battery life for: CR2032 alone, CR2032 w/ supercap, etc.

[tom66]

Anyone know the maximum current draw of BLE? I would have thought its super low.

Kind of odd examples they use: "Consumer/wearable: location tags, heart rate monitor, blood glucose meter"
Heart rate monitors last forever on a single CR2032, 300+ hours.

Would be cool though to see a comparison of battery life for: CR2032 alone, CR2032 w/ supercap, etc.

Depends on the chipset and transmit power.  Around +3dBm would require ca. 20-30mA for an inefficient radio IC and <10mA for an efficient one. I suspect this chip is more useful for things like Wi-Fi and Zigbee where transmit power can increase and data rates are possibly higher.

[thm_w]

Depends on the chipset and transmit power.  Around +3dBm would require ca. 20-30mA for an inefficient radio IC and <10mA for an efficient one. I suspect this chip is more useful for things like Wi-Fi and Zigbee where transmit power can increase and data rates are possibly higher.

Yeah WiFi would make more sense then, and they don't even mention it in the examples.

[Kasper]

Anyone know the maximum current draw of BLE? I would have thought its super low.

Kind of odd examples they use: "Consumer/wearable: location tags, heart rate monitor, blood glucose meter"
Heart rate monitors last forever on a single CR2032, 300+ hours.

Would be cool though to see a comparison of battery life for: CR2032 alone, CR2032 w/ supercap, etc.

Some wearables use a suprising amount of power.

Heart rate monitors:  I've seen PPG LED drivers that can sink 100mA * multiple channels.  I doubt that is needed on the wrist but maybe upper arm or chest.

I've also seen a pump, a 500mW valve and even a 4W heater in different wearables.

[Kasper]

Here's one for heart rate and SpO2.  3 channels that each source up to 124mA, for 117us.

https://www.analog.com/en/products/max86141.html

The MAX86140/MAX86141 integrates three precision LED driver-current DACs that modulate LED pulses for a variety of optical measurements. The LED current DACs have 8-bits of dynamic range with four programmable full-scale ranges of 31mA, 62mA, 94mA, and 124mA. The LED drivers are low dropout current sources, allowing for low-noise, power-supply independent LED currents to be sourced at the lowest supply voltage possible; therefore minimizing LED power consumption. The LED pulse width can be programmed from 14.8μs to 117.3μs to allow the algorithms to optimize SpO2 and HR accuracy at the lowest dynamic power consumption dictated by the application.