Patent 7895458 was granted and assigned to Samsung on February, 2011 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
A power control apparatus including an active block in which power is always maintained in an on state and an N number of power management units having a hierarchical structure where N is a natural number greater than or equal to 1. Each of the power management units controls power of at least one power domain block Power of a first power management unit of the N number of the power management units is controlled by the active block, and power of an Nth power management unit of the N number of the power management units is controlled by an (N−1)th power management unit.