Trending RF & Microwave News Stories of the Week (2

Samsung Developing Distributed FD-MIMO Solutions for Next-Gen Wireless Technology

Samsung has started research and development on Distributed FD-MIMO, which has the potential to become the next generation of radio technology. With Distributed FD-MIMO, Samsung aims to continue the innovation stream and achieve better performance and come up with another success story similar to FD-MIMO to take the industry forward to the next level.

FD-MIMO (also known as Massive MIMO, hyper MIMO, very large MIMO) is the use of a large number of antennas, tens, hundreds, and thousands, to dramatically increase the throughput and energy efficiency to a multitude of communications devices. It is commonly seen as the solution to many of the challenges associated with upcoming 5G technologies, especially in extremely high traffic urban areas that also require many very high throughput connections. Click here to read more.

Qorvo Wins US Gov Contract to Create Advanced, State-of-the-Art, RF Semiconductor Packaging Center

Qorvo, a leading provider of innovative RF solutions that connect the world, has been selected by the U.S. government to create a State-of-the-Art (SOTA) Heterogeneous Integrated Packaging (SHIP) RF production and prototyping center. The SHIP program will ensure that microelectronics packaging expertise and leadership are available for both U.S. defense contractors and commercial clients that require design, validation, assembly, test, and manufacturing of next-generation RF components.

The exclusive SHIP Other Transaction Agreement (OTA), worth up to $75 million, was awarded to Qorvo by the Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC), Crane Division. This program is funded by the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering’s (OUSD R&E) Trusted and Assured Microelectronics Program (T&AM), and is administered by the Strategic & Spectrum Missions Advanced Resilient Trusted System (S²MARTS) Other Transaction Agreement (OTA), managed by National Security Technology Accelerator (NSTXL). Click here to read more.

GLOBALFOUNDRIES and Soitec Sign RF-SOI Wafer Supply Agreement for the Growing 5G Market

Leading specialty foundry, GLOBALFOUNDRIES (GF), has announced a multi-year supply agreement with semiconductor materials company, Soitec, for 300 mm RF silicon-on-insulator (RF-SOI) wafers. Building on the long partnership between the two companies, this strategic agreement secures the supply of wafers that will allow GF to further expand its critical role in providing solutions for the next-generation mobile phone market. The agreement was finalized earlier this week in a virtual signing ceremony with leadership from both companies.

The primary driver of this wafer supply agreement is the growth of GF’s most advanced RF-SOI solution, 8SW RF SOI. The leading RF front-end-module (FEM) platform with best-in-class switches and low noise amplifiers, 8SW RF-SOI is optimized to deliver the differentiated combination of performance, power efficiency, and digital integration required by the designers and suppliers of current and future 4G LTE and sub-6 GHz 5G smartphones. This new platform is using the most advanced RF-SOI substrates developed by Soitec. GF’s 8SW RF-SOI customers include the top FEM providers for 5G sub-6 GHz smartphones. Click here to read more.

HRL Labs Working on Developing W-Band Nitrogen-Polar GaN Amplifiers for the US Navy

Scientists at HRL Laboratories are working on a project that could result in a disruptive improvement in radar, electronic warfare, and communications capabilities. If they are successful, the W-band, nitrogen-polar (N-polar) gallium nitride (GaN) low-noise amplifier could be the world’s first such device, launching a new generation of defense-oriented electronics applications with a possible improvement of 4 times the output power in W-band over HRL’s existing technology.

By leveraging experience from designing many of the fastest electronics in existence, the HRL team will design the new amplifier to enhance range and sensitivity of sensors and high-frequency receivers far beyond current specifications. Sponsored by the Office of Naval Research (ONR), the initial project aims to demonstrate design, fabrication, and functional testing of an N-polar GaN millimeter-wave integrated circuit that will enable the first W-band amplifier using the advanced semiconductor material. Click here to read more.

Lextrum’s Full Duplex Technology Achieves 100% Throughput Improvement in TDD Systems

Lextrum, a COMSovereign Holding Corp. company, has completed the hardware and firmware integration of its in-band full duplex passive suppression and active cancellation technology. This aims to maximize utilization of the available spectrum to address the explosive growth of wireless data traffic. Based upon initial testing, Lextrum has verified that its proprietary in-band full duplex hardware and firmware technology can mitigate an aggregate 120 dB of self-interference resulting in 100% throughput improvement over current Time Division Duplex-based systems like those utilized in 3G and Wi-Fi networks.

Full Duplex, the ability to simultaneously broadcast and receive wireless signals over a single wireless channel, has the potential to dramatically increase the throughput and spectral efficiency in increasingly congested and contested spectrum bands. Lextrum’s proprietary in-band full duplex technology addresses the limitation of Time and/or Frequency Division Duplexing (TDD/FDD respectively) methods by delivering up to a 100% throughput improvement over temporal based systems. Lextrum will complete its in-band full duplex technology integration with a 3GPP Release 15 LTE Software Defined Radio (SDR) by year-end. The company expects to begin over-the-air interoperability testing of its in-band full duplex enabled 4G LTE-A proof-of-concept SDR using its FCC granted experimental license starting next quarter. Click here to read more.

Apple Ditches Qualcomm to Design its Own 5G mm-Wave Antenna Module for the iPhone 12

A recent teardown by iFixit of the new iPhone 12 revealed that Apple is using antenna modules designed by Universal Scientific Industrial (USI), a Shanghai based SiP design and manufacturing company, instead of Qualcomm’s offerings. iFixit is a wiki-based site that teaches people how to fix almost anything. They also empower individuals to share their technical knowledge with the rest of the world.

Apple chose to ditch Qualcomm in the mmWave 5G department even though most other mmWave 5G smartphones used Qualcomm 5G mmWave antenna module. The antenna embedded in the frame of the iPhone 12 is a USI product, labeled 339M00104 S30U7FH. The US variant of iPhone 12 comes with these 5G mmWave antenna modules—one embedded in the side of the frame, and another on the back of the logic board. Click here to read more.

Septentrio Introduces High-Precision Positioning and Heading GNSS Receiver Module

Septentrio, a leader in high-precision GNSS positioning solutions, expanded its GNSS module portfolio with the introduction of mosaic-H^TM heading receiver. With dual antenna capabilities, this surface mount module delivers reliable heading & pitch or heading & roll information on top of centimeter-level positioning. It supports the American GPS, European Galileo, Russian GLONASS, Chinese BeiDou, Japan’s QZSS and India’s NavIC satellite constellations.

mosaic-H is the new addition to Septentrio’s existing mosaic module family, which already includes high-performance RTK and timing modules as well as modules with integrated GNSS corrections. Having a single standard footprint across multiple specialized receiver modules enables integrators to create multiple application-specific products based on a single design. Click here to read more.

Wireless Train-to-Ground Connectivity Link Demonstrated with 11.3 Gbps Throughput

ELVA’s manufacturing partner in Russia (DOK Ltd) has reported a successful test of the PPC-10G train-to-ground communication system on St. Petersburg to Helsinki railway line at a measured section between the Solnechnoye and Zelenogorsk stations. The PPC-10G 70/80 GHz wireless radios were successfully tested for train-to-ground connectivity under real railway conditions on a high-speed railway line. The max aggregated throughput at two wireless channels from the head and back of the specialized communications testing carriage reached 11.3 Gbps.

This train-to-ground communication system is designed to solve the problem of providing high-speed trains with a broadband Internet connection on straight sections of the railway. In the experiments, the test track section of 6.3 km was included three passes at a distance of 2,300, 1,300, and 2,700 m between base stations. The base stations were equipped with compact 30 cm diameter antennas and were located on contact wire supports at a height of about 5 m from the railhead. Click here to read more.

UK Government Working with Companies to Reduce the Impact of Wind Farms on Defense Radars

In a move that could significantly boost the UK’s renewable energy growth, contracts have been awarded to Thales, QinetiQ, Saab, TWI and Plextek DTS to fast-track their ideas for technologies that could mitigate the impact of wind farms on the UK’s air defense radar system. By guaranteeing that essential defense communications are not affected, more wind farms can be built, creating a greener and more technologically sustainable Britain in record time. The MOD’s Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA) is spearheading the innovation competition on behalf of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), the Royal Air Force (RAF), and the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl).

Testimonials of Ministers and Defense staff: Click here to read more.

Ultra-High Power SSPA System for Satellite Tracking and Deep Space Communications

Advantech Wireless Technologies has released its new DeepBlu-Series 8.5kW Wideband C-Band Modular SSPA System for LEO, MEO and GEO applications that include Satellite Telemetry, Tracking, and Control (TT&C) and Deep Space Communications.

The newly designed DeepBlu-Systems consist of multiple high-power SSPAs packaged in ruggedized, outdoor enclosures and integrated into a single frame structure that includes combiners, loads, power distribution and M&C – perfectly suited for fixed and full motion antenna installations. Modular architecture with 1:N built-in redundancy and field replaceable amplifiers minimizes downtime, resulting in the highest service availability in the industry. Click here to read more.

Qorvo Acquires Ultra-Wideband (UWB) Software Provider 7Hugs Labs

Qorvo®, a leading provider of innovative RF solutions, has acquired Paris-based 7Hugs Labs S.A.S., a leading software provider for ultra-wideband (UWB) applications. The acquisition of 7Hugs Labs helps strengthen Qorvo’s UWB product offering for smartphones and other devices that increase the accuracy of a host of new location and communication services.

7Hugs Labs was founded in 2014 and has been a trusted software partner for Decawave, which is now the UWB business unit (UWBU) within Qorvo's Mobile Product business. As part of Qorvo, the 35-member 7Hugs Labs team will help create complete UWB solutions – including chips, firmware and software – for a broad ecosystem that is expected to reach billions of devices in the coming years. Click here to read more.

Qualcomm Completes C-V2X Large-scale Capacity Test and Interoperability Demonstration in China

Qualcomm Technologies announced their collaboration with a broad range of companies in China to showcase the complete ecosystem with cellular vehicle-to-everything (C-V2X) at the core, accelerating industry development and commercialization at scale. Together with over 100 automotive and technology companies in China, Qualcomm Technologies participated in China’s 2020 C-V2X Cross-industry & Large-scale Pilot Plugfest, objectively testing and demonstrating performance and reliability of C-V2X in large-scale communication scenarios and exploring performance of this technology in conjunction with map and positioning technologies.

Over 40 automakers, 40+ terminal manufacturers, 10+ chipset solution vendors, 20+ information security vendors, 5 map providers and 5 position vendors took part in this Cross-Industry Interoperability Demonstration and C-V2X Large-scale Capacity Test. Building on the C-V2X Interoperability Demonstration in 2019, the C-V2X Cross-industry Interoperability Demonstration across chip modules, terminals, vehicles, security platforms and map providers used new digital certificate formats, added high-definition maps and positioning, and deployed continuous scenarios closer to reality and commercially oriented applications. Click here to read more.

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Trending RF & Microwave News Stories of the Week (2 - 6 Nov, 2020)