GAAS: Can Silicon Catch the Millimeter Wave?

Transceiver designs implemented in silicon technology are most competitive in design cycle-time and performance versus cost when compared to other technologies. Scaling is driving silicon technology towards gain-bandwidths of 300GHz, enabling circuits operating deep into mm-wave frequency bands (i.e., well above 30 GHz). However, innovations in on-chip passive design and construction currently being pioneered in mixed-signal silicon technologies may be the real technology enablers at these frequencies. Relevant examples are presented from the author’s own work and the recent literature. Index terms — millimeter wave, radio frequency, wireless communication transceivers, integrated circuits, silicon technology.