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Smart antenna could boost 3G

From an original story by Ian Cameron, Electronics Times

A start-up has been formed to commercialise 'smart' antennas that could not only increase third generation (3G) handset and basestation efficiency, but free up network capacity and do away with the need for unsightly basestation towers.

Cambridge-based Antenova, a spin-off from frequency location solutions firm Active RF, is hoping to secure second round funding of at least ý2.5m by the year end.

Dr Graham Cooley, CEO, told Electronics Times that antennas have been ignored in favour of 3G semiconductor and software development: "Mobile phones get smaller and smaller but antennas stay the same. It's still simply a piece of spirally-wound copper." Instead of spreading its signal over 3600 in the power-wasteful fashion of conventional phones, the signal from Antenova's antenna can be steered electronically, sending signals from the handset direct to the nearest basestation, and from the basestation direct to the handset.

Dr Cooley said: "You are not cluttering up the cells around you with your signal, so the network operator can re-use frequency at any time slot."

He says this 'spatial multiplexing' will save battery power for the user, and make the huge prices being paid for 3G spectrum much better value for the network operator.

"Another advantage is that its efficiency is frequency independent," said Dr Cooley. "With copper, as you go up in frequency, the efficiency drops off quite sharply."

In principle, Antenova's antenna would therefore cope better with the higher frequencies required for 3G applications, such as video.

The small size and solid state nature of the technology means that traditional mobile phone infrastructure is potentially eliminated. Basestations will no longer require towers that can cause planning problems, but could instead use street lights or run alongside railways.

The move is particularly significant given that it has been estimated that 3G networks will require up to 10 times the number of existing basestations.

Antenova has been in preliminary talks with 3G handset and basestation developers. Dr Cooley expects to have a product available in 18 months and a revenue stream within two years: "The revenue model is based on manufacturing some components and licensing others."

Antenova currently has seven staff. On the management side, it includes Dr Anthony Winter, a co-founder of optical networking firm Kymata. It wants to increase headcount to 22 by the end of the year, most of whom would be engineers, scientists and materials scientists, and is currently recruiting.

Atmel starts up 82GHz SiGe foundry

From an original story in Semiconductor Business News

Atmel Corporation has announced that its wafer fab in Germany is ready to provide IC foundry services using an upgraded silicon-germanium (SiGe) process for chip frequencies up to 82GHz in communications applications.

The upgraded SiGe process and faster transistor speeds enables the San Jose company to extend foundry services to high-speed transmission and fibre optics applications, said Frank Heinricht, chief executive officer of the Atmel Wireless and Microcontroller Division.

Atmel said the new SiGe technology offers transit frequency and maximum oscillation frequency of 82GHz, while providing a noise figure of 1.5dB at 5GHz. Transistors can operate at 2.5V or 4.0V, said the company. In addition to the high-speed transistors, the SiGe technology supports the integration of passive components, such as resistors, capacitors and inductors.

For prototyping, foundry customers have a choice between a full engineering run of wafers or a die on multi-project wafers, said Atmel, which operated a 300mm SiGe fab in Heilbronn, Germany. Prototypes can be delivered nine weeks after completion of designs. Design manuals as well as design kits from Cadence Design Systems Inc. are now available, and prototype wafers are now beginning to run in the Heilbronn plant.

Fujitsu creates 30GHz BiCMOS for RFICs

From an original story in Semiconductor Business News

Fujitsu's Microelectronics Europe GmbH subsidiary has announced the development of a 30GHz BiCMOS process for mobile communications and wireless applications.

The new process, called UESBIC4, will be used to produce Fujitsu's MB15H series of radio-frequency large-scale integrated devices with double the performance of previously available BiCMOS ICs, said the company.

Transistors in the bipolar section of the BiCMOS are characterised by a "U-groove" isolated double-polysilicon emitter-base, self-aligned structure, which Fujitsu said dramatically improves the frequency performance. Fujitsu said it is able to extend the operating frequency range far over 3GHz.

The process uses bipolar transistor widths down to 0.2mm. With a transit frequency (ft) of 30GHz, a noise figure (NF) of 0.6dB can be achieved, said Fujitsu. The CMOS gate length in the BiCMOS process is 0.35ým. Fujitsu said it is using trench isolation technique in the new BiCMOS processes to minimise crosstalk and allow suitable functioning in high frequency circuits. A new thin metal-insulator-metal (MIM) capacitor offers capacitance of 2.8fF per square micrometre, said the company.

The new process will be targeted at a range of wireless devices, including those serving third-generation (3G) mobile phones, such as W-CDMA, which require low-power dissipation.