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Key Takeaways from APEC 2026
Veröffentlicht April 23, 2026 von Conor Quinn
Blog Summary
- APEC 2026 highlights applied innovation: The conference emphasized real world power electronics applications, aligning closely with Advanced Energy’s (AE’s) mission and showcasing strong industry engagement.
- Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping power infrastructure: Packed sessions focused on delivering massive, fast changing power to AI GPUs, spotlighting advances in power topologies, cooling, vertical power delivery, and energy storage.
- Bidirectional GaN and AE leadership stood out: Monolithic bidirectional GaN switches emerged as a breakthrough technology, while Advanced Energy demonstrated leadership with technical talks and precision power solutions for datacenter and medical applications.
The 2026 Applied Power Electronics Conference (APEC) recently concluded in San Antonio, Texas. This annual gathering of the power electronics community combines a technical conference, an exposition, and many formal and informal networking opportunities with customers, suppliers and industry peers.
As its name implies, the emphasis of APEC is on the “Applied”, which aligns well with Advanced Energy’s mission to design and manufacture highly engineered, precision power conversion, measurement, and control solutions for mission-critical applications and processes.
With hundreds of presenters and thousands of attendees, it’s impossible to capture all the technologies and solutions presented, but here are two of my key takeaways.
The artificial intelligence (AI) boom depends on advances in power conversion
Everywhere, people seem to be talking about AI. APEC was no exception. Multiple sessions addressed power conversion and power delivery needs for AI computing. Most of these sessions were full and standing room only. This situation is not unusual at APEC for topics that are in vogue. But this is the first time in my 30 years participating in APEC that I have experienced multiple sessions where attendees queued to get into the sessions, forcing the organizers to relocate to a larger room.
As GPUs consume ever increasing levels of power for AI training and inference, the rack and power infrastructure that enables these applications is rapidly evolving. Technical sessions and seminars alike covered a range of AI power topics including topologies, packaging, cooling, power distribution, and energy storage. Also addressed was the immense challenge of delivering thousands of amps to the GPU itself, while responding to sudden load changes in a demanding thermal environment. Topics on vertical power delivery took center stage as the limitations of lateral power delivery are exposed.
Bi-directional switches emerge to enable new and improved solutions
Wide bandgap (WBG) technology and devices have been covered for many years at APEC, and silicon-carbide and gallium-nitride (GaN) devices have now been broadly adopted. However, a new emerging application of gallium-nitride received a lot of attention at this year’s conference.
Up to recently, applications that required bidirectional switches – simultaneously capable of blocking both positive and negative applied voltages and controlling current flow in either direction – have required multiple dies to be used for a single switch.
Lateral GaN technology has enabled monolithic solutions to this problem. With one large microinverter manufacturer now in production with such devices and multiple suppliers showing these bidirectional devices in their booths, these devices are poised for a breakthrough. The technology and applications of bidirectional switches were broadly covered at APEC 2026 in technical presentations, professional education seminars and even in one of the lively debate sessions.
Advanced Energy showcased precision power solutions and capability
In addition to displaying newly launched products in the expo hall, Advanced Energy (AE) had the opportunity to present its precision power capability and technology leadership in multiple technical forums at the conference.
Leveraging his expertise in datacenter power and leadership role in the Open Compute Project (OCP), AE’s Harry Soin, senior director, product marketing in System Power, walked a full-house through the “Evolution of Higher Power Racks - Path to 1MW and beyond.” His presentation addressed the evolution from 48 V to 800 V distributed architectures, the role of energy storage to address backup and transient challenges, and the need for liquid-cooled solutions to manage thermal challenges in high power-density environments.
Phelim Bradley, a leading engineer in AE’s Medical Product Group, dove into new technologies for patient treatment in “Powering Precision: The Wide Bandgap Revolution in Electrosurgery.” He explained how new component technologies are being adopted and refined in high voltage and pulsed power technologies to deliver better patient outcomes.
As power converters continue to proliferate and become more central in the treatment of patients, regulatory aspects of powering medical equipment and devices continue to evolve. Frank Cirolia, AE’s manager, field applications in Global Sales, discussed this changing landscape and the capabilities required to safely bring product to market in his presentation “What it takes to make an IEC60601 Medical Power Supply.”
For more information about Advanced Energy’s expertise in the datacenter and medical industries, visit: Data Center Computing | Advanced Energy and Medical Grade Power Supplies for OEM Devices | Advanced Energy.
Conor Quinn
Advanced Energy
Conor Quinn is Vice President of Marketing for High Volume Products at Advanced Energy. He has over 30 years of experience in the power electronics industry in various design, technology and management roles. He is a past general chair of the Applied Power Electronics Conference and served as co-chair of PSMA’s Power Technology Roadmap. He has also contributed to the development of multiple industry standards including the Power Management Bus (PMBus), Advanced Telecom Computing Architecture (AdvancedTCA) and Micro Telecom Computing Architecture (MicroTCA). Conor received his BE in Electrical Engineering from University College Cork in Ireland and MSEE and PhD degrees from the University of Minnesota.
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