Patent ID: 7123054

Claim:
A semiconductor integrated circuit device comprising: a semiconductor integrated circuit formed in a semiconductor chip; a switching element that is formed in the semiconductor chip and has a current path whose one end and the other end are both connected to the semiconductor integrated circuit, the switching element receiving a control signal and causing a current to flow from said one end to the other end of the current path by a bipolar operation; and a control circuit that is formed in the semiconductor chip and configured to control a conductive/non-conductive state of the current path of the switching element, the control circuit producing, when a voltage across both ends of the current path exceeds a predetermined voltage value, the control signal that renders the current path of the switching element conductive, and rendering the current path of the switching element non-conductive when the voltage across both ends of the current path does not exceed the predetermined voltage value; wherein said switching element is a bipolar transistor that has one of a collector and an emitter, which corresponds to said one end of the current path, the other of the collector and the emitter, which corresponds to the other end of the current path, and a base tat receives the control signal.