3D Tempered Glass-Covered Metasurface Antenna-in-Package Enabling Reliable 5G/6G Smartphone Beam Coverage

This paper introduces a technology to improve beam coverage using tempered glass (provided by corning) used in commercial smartphone and a metasurface. In the proposed 3D Tempered Glass-Covered Metasurface Antenna-in-Package (MSAiP), tempered glass is covered on the AiP, and the metasurface is inserted between the AiP and the glass. The inserted metasurface is made through 2-port circuit modeling, and its physical size is small considering the narrow smartphone mounting space. In order to minimize the performance degradation caused by glass when AiP is mounted in a smartphone, performance optimization is carried out while AiP, metasurface, and glass are all combined. The peak gains of MSAiP are 13.5 dBi (27 GHz) and 13.1 dBi (38.5 GHz), whereas those of AiP without metasurface are 10.1 dBi (27 GHz) and 9.4 dBi (38.5 GHz). Besides, the peak EIRP (dBm)/tilting degree (°) of chip-coupled MSAiP are 6.59/0, 5.87/12, and 3.37/27. However, the results of chip-coupled AiP without metasurface are 2.01/0, 1.6/12, and −0.95/30. All these results indicate that beam coverage of AiP is improved by the inserted metasurface.