Laminate with thermal - Power insert for efficient front-side heat removal and power delivery

Abstract

In this work a innovative way to provide power and cooling through a PCB to and from a high-power IC die is presented. A copper insert consisting of laminated copper sheets is inserted into the PCB to provide Vdd and GND to the chip. The proposed structure is analyzed thermally and electrically using 3D FEM simulations. The feasibility of the concept and the validation of the modelling results were shown experimentally on a demonstrator. Thermal measurement of the insert reveal a thermal conductivity through the laminate of 320 ± 50 W m−1 K−1. This concept is twice as efficient in dissipating the heat then state-of-the-art solutions with thermal vias in the PCB. The final junction-to-heat sink thermal resistance of the through laminate cooling is almost equivalent to that of the chip-backside cooling solution with a lid and TIM1 and 2.