Electronic Design Weekly: July 13, 2026 - Battery-Management System (BMS)
In This Issue
- Editorial: Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS)
- Featured Content
- New Products
- Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS)
- Multimedia on ElectronicDesign
- Editor's Choice: From the ElectronicDesign Archives
- Editor's Weekly Picks
- Illustrated Engineering
- Electronic Design Word of the Week
- New in Electronic Design's Member Library
- More Electronic Design Weekly
Welcome to Electronic Design's weekly publication where you can find the latest articles, videos, and podcasts. Think of it as Electronic Design magazine where you can read about the latest technologies and products.
Check back as we add more content is added every day. You can sign up for our daily newsletter to see the latest articles as they're posted. Check out the latest newsletters. You can also check out archived versions of Electronic Design Weekly.
Editorial: Battery-Management IC Uses EIS to Monitor Cells Inside and Out
A battery-management system (BMS) oversees everything about a battery pack, monitoring not only to optimize its overall runtime, but also safety and longevity. However, a commercial BMS has its limits.
The only accessible signals are typically the cell voltages, pack current, and a limited number of temperature sensors that all effectively measure the cells from the outside, providing a relatively coarse view of the battery pack’s condition. They can’t fully reveal the electrochemical changes occurring deep inside the cells.
To shine a light into the cells, Infineon, NXP, Texas Instruments, and other companies are now bringing a method called electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) into the cell-level BMS. TI’s latest battery monitor, the BQ79826Z-Q1, uses an integrated EIS engine to measure the impedance of each cell in real-time. By detecting subtle changes in cell impedance, EIS can help improve safety and longevity by identifying potential failures before they occur rather than after the fact.
EIS is a big deal for battery energy storage systems (BESS) coming online to support the rapid growth of renewable energy and the surge in AI data centers. With the lifespan of a BESS spanning 15 to 20 years, it can help detect degradation and potential safety events, including thermal runaway, well in advance. EIS also enables more accurate state-of-charge (SOC) calculations for LFP batteries, which are widely used in BESS solutions but present a challenge due to their very flat voltage curves.
To read the full story, including insights from Wenjia Liu, vice president and general manager of BMS technology at TI, subscribe to Electronic Design’s Power and Analog newsletter (click here) and have it delivered to your inbox.
Editor's Choice: From the ElectronicDesign Archives
These articles were chosen by the editors at ElectronicDesign that complement the new articles above. They’re included in our regular newsletters.
Bill Wong's Picks of the Week
Check out Machine Design's Takeover Week on Automation and Robotics. It has some great articles like:
- The Evolution of Cobots and Single Pair Ethernet (SPE)
Cobots are taking on repetitive and heavy-duty tasks in factories and warehouses, while Single Pair Ethernet and standardized connectors are creating the connected backbone for smarter automation. - Coding Smarter, Not Harder: Integrating AI into Programming Workflow
Love it or loathe it, AI is reshaping engineering, and the winners will be those who learn to work alongside it.
Andy's Picks from Around the Web
A $5M startup claims rare earth-free electric motor breakthrough [the original Tesla DU used an induction motor...no rare earths]. Link
Everyone Is Afraid Of EV Battery Degradation. It's All The Nissan Leaf's Fault. Link
Oxford electric bus progress 2026: researchers report lower nitrogen dioxide and quieter streets after 159 battery-electric buses entered service [this article strangely does not acknowledge reduced brake dust emissions via regenerative braking and implies it's the same...]. Link
Microsoft's AI drive saw its carbon emissions grow by 25 percent in 2025. The company said it wanted to be carbon negative by 2030. Link
Mechanical Engineer Tom Stanton is working on a supersonic trebuchet. Video
Click here to see Andy's full list of the latest articles and news.
EV Market Stabilizes in Q2, as New Entries Help Slow Sharp Sales Decline. Link
Auburn California Flock Surveillance Cameras Stolen and Dumped in a Canal. Link
Flock cameras coming down in Westland; councilmember says contract not renewed. Link
[Are you a bored, Bay Area, tech nerd with RSU money that you don't know where to spend? After the cancer society donation, there's this...] Giant fighting robots step into the ring at new San Francisco storefront for boxing bots. Link
Group-wide sales of Mercedes-Benz battery-electric vehicles increased 50% year-over-year. Link
Apple allegedly alleges OpenAI encouraged poached Apple employees to bring over confidential presentations, secret prototypes, and key supplier details. Link
China’s optical chip breakthrough boosts AI speed 100-fold using fraction of compute power. Link
Microsoft confirms Secure Boot update failing on some Windows 11 PCs, blocks update due to known issues. Link
Secret Claude tracker shocks users after Anthropic’s anti-surveillance stance. Link
Gartner forecasts global data center electricity consumption set to grow by 26% this year. Link
The Backlash Is So Strong That People With “Pervert Glasses” Are Afraid to Use Them in Public. Link
US citizen is found guilty of helping export tech to Iran in violation of sanctions. Link
Germany’s Renewable Energy Share Reaches 61.8% As Solar And Wind Set New Records In H1 2026. Link
New York Halts Large Data Centers Being Built For A Year. Link
Sony faces an anti-trust complaint in Mexico over ending PlayStation physical media. Link
While ChatGPT (or Claude, or Gemini) is taking its sweet time thinking of an answer, you can now play interactive games right over the chat UI. Link to Chrome Store
Mistral AI Releases Robostral Navigate: An 8B Model Enabling Robots to Navigate Complex Environments Using a Single RGB Camera. Link
Andy's Video Pick of the Week
We've written a bit about humanoid robots and also have a TechXChange collection of Biomimetic Robots articles that include them.
We can always use contributed aritcles from engineers on robot design, so please contact me to share some of your insight and expertise with engineers from around the world.
In this video, Munro & Associates tear down a Unitree G1 humanoid robot and get into the nuts and bolts of strain-wave vs planetary rotary actuators, ball screw and planetary roller screw linear actuators as well as joint actuation, sensing, and mass location strategies.
enjoy,
-andyT
From the Inventors Comics Collection
Remember that old Coke commercial? Sing it...
“I’d like to teach the world to code (IN perfect harmony)!”
Read all about the inspiration behind my cartoon and more about that old commercial too, after the jump.
Or see my whole Engineering on Friday cartoon catalog here.
New in Electronic Design's Member Library
Are you an Electronic Design member? It’s free and you get access to content like our latest eBooks and editorial webinars. You can also provide feedback about articles.
About the Author
William G. Wong
Senior Content Director - Electronic Design and Microwaves & RF
I am Editor of Electronic Design focusing on embedded, software, and systems. As Senior Content Director, I also manage Microwaves & RF and I work with a great team of editors to provide engineers, programmers, developers and technical managers with interesting and useful articles and videos on a regular basis. Check out our free newsletters to see the latest content.
You can send press releases for new products for possible coverage on the website. I am also interested in receiving contributed articles for publishing on our website. Use our template and send to me along with a signed release form.
Check out my blog, AltEmbedded on Electronic Design, as well as his latest articles on this site that are listed below.
You can visit my social media via these links:
- AltEmbedded on Electronic Design
- Bill Wong on Facebook
- @AltEmbedded on Twitter
- Bill Wong on LinkedIn
I earned a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology and a Masters in Computer Science from Rutgers University. I still do a bit of programming using everything from C and C++ to Rust and Ada/SPARK. I do a bit of PHP programming for Drupal websites. I have posted a few Drupal modules.
I still get a hand on software and electronic hardware. Some of this can be found on our Kit Close-Up video series. You can also see me on many of our TechXchange Talk videos. I am interested in a range of projects from robotics to artificial intelligence.
Roger Engelke Jr.
Managing Editor - Electronic Design and Microwaves & RF
Roger manages the websites and print issues for Electronic Design and Microwaves &RF.
Cabe Atwell
Technology Editor, Electronic Design
Cabe is a Technology Editor for Electronic Design.
Engineer, Machinist, Cartoonist, Maker, Writer. A graduate Electrical Engineer actively plying his expertise in the industry and at his company, Gunhead. When not designing/building, he creates a steady torrent of projects and content in the media world. Many of his projects and articles are online at element14 & SolidSmack, industry-focused work at EETimes & EDN, and offbeat articles at Make Magazine. Currently, you can find him hosting webinars and contributing to Electronic Design and Machine Design.
Cabe is an electrical engineer, design consultant and author with 25 years’ experience. His most recent book is “Essential 555 IC: Design, Configure, and Create Clever Circuits”
Cabe writes the Engineering on Friday blog on Electronic Design.
See Cabe's cartoons & comic strips here.
James Morra
Senior Editor
James Morra is the senior editor for Electronic Design, covering the semiconductor industry and new technology trends, with a focus on power electronics and power management. He also reports on the business behind electrical engineering, including the electronics supply chain. He joined Electronic Design in 2015 and is based in Chicago, Illinois.
Andy Turudic
Technology Editor, Electronic Design
Andy Turudic is a Technology Editor for Electronic Design Magazine, primarily covering Analog and Mixed-Signal circuits and devices and also is Editor of ED's bi-weekly Automotive Electronics newsletter.
He holds a Bachelor's in EE from the University of Windsor (Ontario Canada) and has been involved in electronics, semiconductors, and gearhead stuff, for a bit over a half century. Andy also enjoys teaching his engineerlings at Portland Community College as a part-time professor in their EET program.
"AndyT" brings his multidisciplinary engineering experience from companies that include National Semiconductor (now Texas Instruments), Altera (Intel), Agere, Zarlink, TriQuint,(now Qorvo), SW Bell (managing a research team at Bellcore, Bell Labs and Rockwell Science Center), Bell-Northern Research, and Northern Telecom.
After hours, when he's not working on the latest invention to add to his portfolio of 16 issued US patents, or on his DARPA Challenge drone entry, he's lending advice and experience to the electric vehicle conversion community from his mountain lair in the Pacific Northwet[sic].
AndyT's engineering blog, "Nonlinearities," publishes the 1st and 3rd Tuesday of each month. Andy's OpEd may appear at other times, with fair warning given by the Vu meter pic. His cartoon series, "Inventors", appears each week in Electronic Design Weekly.
Comment About the Article
To join the conversation, and become an exclusive member of Electronic Design, create an account today!
Leaders relevant to this article: