Polymer Coatings for Better Robustness of GaN-based RF Circuits against Corrosion in SiP

In this paper we investigate different polymer coatings to improve robustness in Systems in Packages (SiP) devices for high performance and energy efficient RF-and mm-wave power amplifiers. Cheaper and denser integration of GaN and Si technologies is required. We studied final polymer protection coatings on the semiconductor chip that delay the corrosion phenomenon. Our first results show that BCB seems to be the most efficient protective solution, but there are other materials that could be considered, either for lower dielectric constant or for outstanding electric field handling capability.