Power switch ICs are integrated load switches — single-chip devices that connect or disconnect a power rail under software or hardware control. Inside the package you get the switching FET, gate drive circuitry, slew rate control, overcurrent protection, reverse current blocking, and usually a fault flag pin. That replaces a discrete P-channel MOSFET, gate resistor, and protection components with one part and a simpler layout. They're not regulators: the output voltage is the input voltage minus the resistive drop across the FET (RDS(on) × load current), not a regulated fixed value.

The main variants: single-channel load switches for straightforward per-rail gating (TI's TPS22xx family and Microchip's MIC series are common starting points), multi-channel power distribution switches that handle several rails in one IC, current-limited switches for USB charging ports where the output is clamped to a set current, and e-fuses. E-fuses replace polyfuses with a configurable trip current and a latch-off response on fault — they don't self-reset after a strike, which is the point if you're trying to isolate a fault rather than mask it.

Slew rate matters in practice. Switch on too fast and a large output capacitor draws a spike that collapses the input rail or trips upstream protection. Switch on too slowly and startup sequencing overruns what the supervisor chip expects. Most datasheets give a slew-rate adjust pin with a small external capacitor.

Applications cover USB-A and Type-C port power control, power gating in battery-backed IoT designs where quiescent current is a hard constraint, SOM carrier board rail sequencing, hot-plug server cards, and industrial I/O power management.

TRX sources power switch ICs from Texas Instruments, Maxim/Analog Devices, Microchip, and ON Semiconductor through authorised distribution. No minimum order, so you can pull a few parts to validate the design before committing to production volumes. In-stock lines ship to Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban, and Pretoria. For anything that needs sourcing, we'll give you an actual lead time, not a guess.

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