"Digital control has been the single most important development in power supplies over the last decade and is the most promising advance for the future success of system power management," says Patrick LeFevre, head of marketing and communications at Ericsson Power Modules.
"When combined with best analogue design practice, digital power is an enabling technology through which board-level power modules can be integrated into other digital circuit elements such as processors and memories.
"This gives system architects the ability to precisely monitor and control the level of energy delivered under changing conditions.
"Power modules that incorporate digital control can respond to requests from a central energy management controller and also deliver data about operating conditions that helps in predictive maintenance.
"Despite the ongoing debates about the benefits of analogue versus digital control, for those already using digitally controlled DC/DC converters and point-of-load converters, such debates sound pre-historic.
"Both technologies have their merits and comparing one against another in generic terms is nonsense, particularly when you consider that digitally controlled power modules will always have embedded analogue circuits within them.
"To understand the potential of digital power, imagine a radio-base station powered by solar panels connecting a remote population to a main city. It is vital that communication works all the time and the cellular infrastructure must be energy-optimised at all times.
"Digital power sources optimise energy delivered to the load, monitor and control operational parameters, and make it easy to remotely reconfigure the system without sending an engineer to the remote site."