5 Total Design Cost

When developing a project, the cost of a component is a critical variable to consider. When comparing the prices of the TPS543620 family and the TPSM843620 family, it is clear that the TPS543620 family has a cheaper upfront cost than the TPSM843620 family. This is due to the fact that the TPSM843620 series is a modular design with integrated inductor and capacitor components, giving TPSM843620 series a more comprehensive package than the discrete converter counterpart. The TPS543620 family, is also a discrete design family that requires extra external components to be implemented. While the TPS543620 family has a similar BOM cost to the TPSM843620 family, design complexity and other considerations complicate cost comparison.

The TPS543620 family is a more discrete design where more external components can be required when compared to the TPSM843620 family. While the overall cost of the discrete design and external components might be similar than the initial BOM cost of the TPSM843620 family, there are several additional cost factors to be taken into consideration when using external components. One consideration is the additional cost of qualifying these external components. Before a product is taken into market,the product needs to endure several rounds of extensive qualifications to guarantee that the product can function as intended. Extensive resources are invested in the qualification of a new product after the design process. The addition of external components results in additional resources being dedicated on further testing to see if these components are qualified to be implemented into the design. These additional components and the cost with verifying the components can be cut out of the equation when going with a module component like the TPSM843620 due to many of these external components being integrated into the package. The TPSM843620 undergoes several rounds of internal qualifications before release to make sure a high standard of performance and reliability in any design, which ends up being more cost-effective over time. In the event that failure occurs, it is significantly easier to replace a module component when compared to replacing a discrete component with extra external components.

The monetary cost of testing is a very important factor to consider, but cost of time can be just as important. When going with discrete designs, more time needs to be dedicated to researching and selecting an external component from the list of potential designs. Running these components through a lot of individual stress tests can also be a very time-consuming process. In addition, due to the uncertainty of external components, a failure in the testing process can require a reselection of the components or even a complete redesign of the circuit. This can greatly increase the time complexity of the development process.