EiC Corporation Announces the Development of a High Voltage InGaP HBT Process
Enabling MMIC RF amplifiers for operation at 28V supply
Fremont, California -- EiC Corporation, the company that pioneered InGaP/GaAs MMIC amplifiers has developed a High Voltage version of its original InGaP HBT process. The company's product offering of standard gain blocks was expanded last year to include MMIC amplifiers with output power capable to 2 Watts, at 5V supply. These "Intermediate Power Amplifiers" offer a higher level of design flexibility with an added Bias Select feature, and have been well received in the market.
In order to achieve even higher power capability and meet the needs of customers, EiC Corporation has developed a High Voltage process. "Many wireless customers working on Power Amplifier designs have expressed keen interest in moderate power InGaP HBT drivers for their circuits," said Dr. Barry Lin, Sr. Vice President of Sales and Marketing. "It was obvious we had to have a High Voltage process in order to meet these requirements."
EiC has finalized the development of the High Voltage process and has completed the initial evaluation of engineering devices, with excellent results. BVceo of 35 Volts and BVcbo of 70 Volts have been measured, enabling operation of the devices in the 24 to 28 Volt supply range.
As an example, an amplifier die designed for 1 Watt Class A operation, was shown to achieve 4 Watts performance in Class AB. This amplifier was tested first at 900MHz on an evaluation board. The die is in the traditional MMIC format with 100mm thick substrate and attached to a heat-sink with eutectic solder. A current mirror bias circuit, choke and partial input matching are realized on the same chip, similar to the Low Voltage (5V) "Intermediate Power Amplifiers" family mentioned above. The matching was completed on the evaluation board by surface mount components. 4W RF power was achieved at 28V with 71% efficiency and operating current of 200mA. The Figure below summarizes the result.
The results of this characterization will be reported in June by Dr. Larry Wang, Sr. Vice President of Engineering, at the IEEE MTT-S conference in Philadelphia. Look for his paper presentation, "High Efficiency 28V Class AB InGaP/GaAs HBT MMIC Amplifier with Integrated Bias Circuit," at the Conference.
"The success of this development paves the way for 28V InGaP/GaAs HBT MMIC amplifiers to be defined and produced by EiC in the near future," stated Jerry Curtis, President of the company. "This is an extremely exciting success and tremendous accomplishment by our engineering organization. EiC has again proven its engineering prowess," Mr. Curtis said.
The first products using this High Voltage InGaP HBT technology will be introduced later this year.
About EiC Corporation
EiC is an ISO 9001-certified manufacturer that designs, develops, manufactures and markets proprietary radio frequency integrated circuits (RFICs) primarily for wireless communications products. EiC owns and operates a GaAs fab in Fremont, California and offers a broad portfolio of power amplifier products for wireless infrastructure such as cellular base stations, repeaters, wireless LAN's, cable television, and optical networks; as well as power amplifiers modules for cellular handsets and PDA's including GSM/GPRS; CDMA cellular and PCS; TDMA; and WCDMA. For additional information see our website at www.eiccorp.com.
The contents of this press release contains EiC's "forward-looking statements" which may include, but not limited to, the information about EiC's product specifications, business plans, and market analyses. EiC does not warrant the accuracy of such information and use by any party of the said information is entirely at the party's own risk. At EiC's sole discretion such information may be amended or revised by EiC without any further notice.