Keysight Technologies recently published a case study describing how mmTron’s 28 GHz, 50 watt power amplifier (PA) MMIC was developed using the Keysight RF EDA environment.
The TMC211 was designed to provide 50 watts saturated output power across 27 to 31 GHz, with 53 dBm OIP3 and 28% power-aided efficiency. The design is the highest power, single die, GaN MMIC commercially announced. The unique single die PA eliminates the combining losses from a multiple die design; however, the power density requires careful thermal design.
mmTron designers used ADS as the center of the TMC211 workflow. After initial simulations using sinusoidal stimulation, ADS enabled application waveforms to be used.
“There are many PA subtleties that only appear under modulated signals,” says Seyed Tabatabaei, mmTron’s CEO. “How the signal phase changes between stages, memory effects, interactions with capacitor values and placements, and power consumption all depend on modulation.”
Circuit simulation was only part of the workflow. mmTron employed the other EDA tools in Keysight PathWave, including ADS Electro-Thermal Simulator. ADS combines the native EM simulator and the electro-thermal extension in a single interface without layout conversions.
mmTron's design was one of three examples shown in Keysight's video highlighting its RF EDA environment.