Energy Storage – from grid support to a digital energy system

Highly integrated, pre-certified BMS SoCs for functional safety monitor and protect battery packs. They simplify secure communication between cells, power electronics and control. In practice, they support the trend towards more compact, more cost-efficient and at the same time safety-critical storage solutions that absorb load peaks, integrate renewable energies and work stably in the field for years.

The most important technology trends include higher integration of measurement, protection and diagnostic functions, more precise state estimation for SoC and SoH, faster responses to fault patterns, and more robust communication paths such as CAN FD and IsoSPI. In parallel, functional safety is gaining weight, because operators and manufacturers of BESS increasingly rely on standard-oriented, certification-friendly platforms in order to reduce development times and validation effort. Predictive monitoring and software-supported fault detection are also becoming more important, in order to detect failures early and increase availability.

On the semiconductor side, two developments currently shape the market for highly integrated, pre-certified BMS SoCs: first, devices with integrated functional safety, self-diagnosis and redundancy functions are coming more strongly into focus, because they simplify certification and increase resilience in BESS applications. Second, manufacturers increasingly rely on SoCs that bundle more precise cell voltage and temperature measurement, faster fault detection and secure communication interfaces in a single chip. Added to this is the trend towards modularly scalable platforms that can be adapted more easily to different cell chemistries, voltage levels and system sizes. In practice, this means fewer external components, lower complexity in pack design and shorter development times with a higher level of safety at the same time.

BESS not only buffer energy; as connected infrastructure elements they also have to be secured against manipulation, failures and supply chain risks. Digital identities create transparency about the origin, configuration, condition and lifecycle of a battery, while hardware-supported security functions protect identities, keys and firmware at device level. The most important trends include secure boot and update processes, tamper-resistant hardware root-of-trust approaches, end-to-end traceability along the supply chain, and closer alignment with industrial and energy security standards such as IEC 62443 and ISO/IEC 27001.

Among battery trends, circular business models, second-life applications and digital product passports are also coming into focus, because operators and manufacturers increasingly have to prove exactly which cells, modules and components are built into a storage system and how they have been operated. In parallel, pressure is growing to consider OT and IT security together, in order to harden BESS against ransomware, unauthorised remote access and configuration errors.

In semiconductor technology, secure elements, microcontrollers with integrated security functions, hardware-based key storage and trusted authentication are therefore becoming ever more relevant. Equally important are robust edge and communication devices that secure identities locally while being energy-efficient, updatable and designed for industrial long-term availability.

State-of-charge algorithms (SoC) estimate the current charge level of a battery storage system, state-of-health algorithms (SoH) assess the ageing condition and thus the remaining performance. Both are central to BESS, because they control how safely, efficiently and economically a storage system is operated.

Current trends are above all the use of data-driven models based on deep learning, hybrid approaches combining physics and AI, and adaptive control for real-time operation. Hybrid approaches combine physical prior knowledge with learning models so that forecasts become more precise and at the same time more robust. Added to this are digital twins, explainable AI (which makes it traceable why a model arrives at a particular prediction) and forecasting models that capture not only the charge level but also degradation and fault patterns better.

In semiconductor technology, the focus is therefore shifting to edge AI and specialised computing cores. In demand are energy-efficient AI accelerators, FPGA-based platforms, RISC-V and TPU-like architectures, and TinyML-capable designs that can run SoC/SoH models with little memory and low latency. For BESS, this means more intelligence in battery management with lower energy demand and better real-time capability at the same time.

In high-voltage storage systems (systems with voltages from over 60 volts up to several hundred volts), isolated communication is a central element, because it secures data paths between high-voltage areas, battery monitoring and power electronics. In rack architectures, the focus is above all on the reliable connection of individual battery modules, sensors and control units, while cluster architectures additionally have to secure stable communication between several racks and the higher-level system layer.

Current trends include more robust Ethernet and fieldbus solutions that enable fast and interference-proof data transmission both within the rack and between clusters. Added to this are more strongly integrated protection concepts against overvoltage and transient interference that run along the entire communication chain. At the same time, modular, scalable designs are gaining importance, because BESS projects can then be adapted more easily to different power ratings and plant layouts.

In semiconductor technology, isolated transceivers, digital isolators and interface devices with high immunity to interference are therefore coming into focus. Low power consumption, compact designs and high data rates combined with robust dielectric strength are important. For rack and cluster systems, it thus becomes decisive that communication remains not only secure, but also flexible, easy to maintain and resilient in the long term.

The market for BESS is characterised by high investment pressure, regulatory requirements and rapid expansion of storage, grid and industrial capacity. Reference designs and modular semiconductor platforms help providers reduce development cycles considerably, because they provide proven building blocks, documented interfaces and tested system architectures. Instead of designing every function from scratch, developers can build on validated preliminary work, reduce risks earlier and move from prototype to series production faster. Companies benefit from shorter time-to-market, lower development costs, more predictable quality results and faster scaling.

At the same time, BESS and their components are increasingly integrated into compact platforms: power electronics, control and software work together more closely. Digital monitoring and diagnostics continuously supply data on condition, efficiency and possible faults. Modular architectures make scaling and variant creation easier. More efficient semiconductors reduce losses, while connected development processes speed up testing, coordination and approvals.