Nova-Microchip Team Up on Battery-Management Reference Platform
What you'll learn:
- Microchip Technology and Nova Semiconductor have joined forces to develop a complete, pre-validated reference platform for a battery-management system.
- The new platform will pair Nova’s NB1600 battery-management system (BMS) silicon with Microchip’s industry-proven MCUs and firmware ecosystem.
- The BMS is expected to provide highly precise state-of-charge tracking with simultaneous cell and current measurement at high accuracy (1 mV, 0.02% SOC repeatability).
Nova Semiconductor recently announced that it’s collaborating with Microchip Technology to deliver a complete, pre-validated reference platform for a battery-management system (BMS). The solution pairs Nova’s NB1600 BMS silicon with Microchip’s MCUs and firmware ecosystem.
Nova’s NB1600 simplifies battery-management architecture by pre-integrating many specialized functions required to achieve advanced functionality. Microchip provides the MCU hardware and the core firmware stack required to manage and control the system.
Key technical capabilities of the combined reference architecture include:
- Complete battery-management functionality, with minimal firmware development effort.
- Simultaneous cell and current measurement with high accuracy (1-mV measurement, 0.02% SOC repeatability) for highly precise state-of-charge tracking.
- Dedicated ADC and reference per cell to ensure maximum signal integrity.
- An on-chip electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) system for real battery systems.
- Reduced integration risk with a solution that helps simplify safety-oriented design decisions, fault handling, and system validation.
- Support for functional-safety goals with an architecture that helps the BMS detect faults early, communicate critical events, and take timely protective action.
About the Author
Lee Goldberg
Contributing Editor
Lee is the author of the popular PowerBites series.
Lee Goldberg is a self-identified “Recovering Engineer,” Maker/Hacker, Green-Tech Maven, Aviator, Gadfly, and Geek Dad. He spent the first 18 years of his career helping design microprocessors, embedded systems, renewable energy applications, and the occasional interplanetary spacecraft. After trading his ‘scope and soldering iron for a keyboard and a second career as a tech journalist, he’s spent the next two decades at several print and online engineering publications.
Lee’s current focus is power electronics, especially the technologies involved with energy efficiency, energy management, and renewable energy. This dovetails with his coverage of sustainable technologies and various environmental and social issues within the engineering community that he began in 1996. Lee also covers 3D printers, open-source hardware, and other Maker/Hacker technologies.
Lee holds a BSEE in Electrical Engineering from Thomas Edison College, and participated in a colloquium on technology, society, and the environment at Goddard College’s Institute for Social Ecology. His book, “Green Electronics/Green Bottom Line - A Commonsense Guide To Environmentally Responsible Engineering and Management,” was published by Newnes Press.
Lee, his wife Catherine, and his daughter Anwyn currently reside in the outskirts of Princeton N.J., where they masquerade as a typical suburban family.
Facts Only
* Nova Semiconductor and Microchip Technology developed a reference platform for a battery-management system (BMS).
* The platform pairs Nova’s NB1600 BMS silicon with Microchip’s MCUs and firmware ecosystem.
* Nova’s NB1600 simplifies battery-management architecture by pre-integrating specialized functions.
* Microchip provides the MCU hardware and the core firmware stack.
* The combined architecture supports complete battery-management functionality with minimal firmware development effort.
* It allows simultaneous cell and current measurement with 1 mV resolution and 0.02% SOC repeatability for state-of-charge tracking.
* The system includes dedicated ADC and reference per cell for signal integrity.
* An on-chip electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) system is included for real battery systems.
* The architecture supports functional-safety goals by enabling early fault detection and protective action.
Executive Summary
Nova Semiconductor and Microchip Technology have collaborated to create a pre-validated reference platform for a battery-management system (BMS). This solution integrates Nova’s NB1600 BMS silicon with Microchip’s Microcontroller Units (MCUs) and firmware ecosystem. The core of the platform involves Nova's NB1600, which incorporates pre-integrated functions to simplify the BMS architecture. Microchip supplies the necessary MCU hardware and the firmware stack for system management and control.
The resulting architecture offers several technical capabilities, including complete battery-management functionality requiring minimal firmware development. It enables simultaneous, high-accuracy measurement of cell voltage and current, achieving 1 mV measurement resolution and 0.02% state-of-charge (SOC) repeatability. The design includes dedicated analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) and reference circuits per cell for signal integrity. Furthermore, the platform incorporates an on-chip electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) system for real battery systems and an architecture supporting functional-safety goals by facilitating early fault detection and protective action.
Full Take
The collaboration demonstrates a trend toward vertically integrated hardware and software solutions aimed at simplifying complex system development, particularly in safety-critical domains like power management. The emphasis on pre-validated reference platforms and reduced integration risk suggests a pattern where abstracting complexity through silicon integration is being leveraged to manage the high cost and risk associated with functional safety compliance. The specific focus on highly precise measurement capabilities (1 mV, 0.02% SOC repeatability) moves the capability from mere monitoring to certified diagnostic information, which has significant downstream implications for reliability and operational safety in energy storage applications.
The structure suggests a systemic drive away from building functional safety features layer by layer onto disparate components, favoring embedded solutions where safety logic is inherent in the hardware design itself. This points toward an underlying paradigm shift where silicon architects are increasingly responsible for managing fault conditions rather than relying solely on post-hoc firmware interpretation. The context provided by the author’s background emphasizes a focus on engineering principles within energy management and sustainable technology, suggesting that this technical synergy aligns with a broader industry trend prioritizing resilient, verifiable systems over incremental feature additions.
What assumptions about the cost of achieving functional safety versus the cost of development effort are embedded in the notion of "reduced integration risk"? What downstream testing or validation protocols will be necessitated by placing EIS and fault detection directly on-chip? How does this specialized integration affect the broader ecosystem regarding open-source hardware adoption and the accessibility of safety validation methodologies for smaller entities?
Sentinel — Human
The text reads like a factual announcement coupled with a background piece, exhibiting characteristics consistent with human-written technical journalism.