Highly-Efficient Broadband Millimeter-Wave 5G Power Amplifiers in GaN, SiGe, and CMOS-SOI

Abstract

We present several broadband high-efficient power amplifier (PA) designs for potential millimeter-wave (mm-Wave) 5G (5th Generation) applications. The PA is targeted to cover the key part of 5G FR2 band (i.e., 24.25 to 43.5 GHz), with $P_{OUT, MAX}$ ≥ 16 dBm and peak power-added-efficiency (PAE) above 30%. We use advanced mm-Wave IC technologies in 40 nm GaN, 22 nm CMOS FD-SOI, and 90 nm SiGe BiCMOS processes to prototype medium-power mm-Wave 5G PAs. Post-layout simulations and preliminary measurement data indicates the PAs should be able to meet the performance targets, and there are design trade-offs on $P_{OUT, MAX}$ and PAE due to different device technologies, circuit topologies (differential, cascode), biasing, matching network, etc.