An Insightful Evaluation of a 650V High-Voltage GaN Technology in Cascode and Stand-Alone Transistors

A switching performance comparison between 650V power transistors is carried out in this work by assembling identical GaN DHEMTs as Stand-Alone (GaN-SA) and Cascode (GaN-CS) in TO-220 and SMD packages. To our knowledge, this is the first time that this comparison is reported using identical DHEMTs. Our investigations are focused on hard-switching measurements also including best-in-class Super-Junction MOSFETs. It is experimentally proven that, after proper GaN-CS optimization, waveform ringing and power loss are significantly reduced with respect to a previous GaN technology. Additional physicsbased simulations help to elucidate power loss mechanisms, identify key parameters and define suitable operation conditions.