OREANDA-NEWS. Toshiba Corporation (TOKYO: 6502) today announced the launch of "TB9057FG", a brushed motor[1]pre-driver IC enhanced to achieve functional safety and for use in electric power steering systems (EPS). Sample shipments will start on April 1st, 2015, with mass production scheduled to start in November, 2016.

More and more safety-critical automotive systems, such as EPS are required to meet the requirements of ASIL-D[2], the highest automotive safety integrity level prescribed in ISO 26262, “Road Vehicles – Functional Safety.”

The new IC integrates key main functions, such as a pre-driver[3] circuit, motor current detection circuit[4], and motor direction detection circuit[5], plus various failure detection circuits, while functions including motor current detection circuit, power supply PIN, and GND PIN are made redundant to secure higher functional safety.

Toshiba has also carried out a range of functional safety analyses to simulate various system failures and will provide customers with documentation to support safety analysis and design.

[1] A motor with a commutator (brush)

[2] ASIL: Automotive Safety Integrity Level

[3] Pre-driver controls the MOSFET for driving motor

[4] Converts motor current to voltage and output to MCU

[5] Detects whether an external MOSFET turns on or off normally and output the direction information to MCU