Operators, equipment manufacturers and chip makers are working together to promote the development of the fifth generation mobile communication standard (ie 5G). The next generation of 4G (also known as Long Term Evolution, or LTE) mobile communications standards now offers 5G data rates in excess of 10Gbps, 100 times more than the current LTE standard. 5G technology can become a reality, it is still a question.

However, 5G market has started to heat up. Anokiwave, Broadcom, Intel, Qorvo, Qualcomm, Samsung and other emerging vendors are developing 5G chips. 5G network deployment is also faced with many challenges, for example, although equipment vendors and chip makers have been developing 5G products, but the 5G standard has not been determined.

5G technology can become a reality, the key in the end where?

Today's LTE networks span from 700MHz to 3.5GHz, while 5G networks are not only compatible with LTE networks, but also need to support unlicensed (device manufacturers do not need to purchase license fees) or millimeter-wave frequency band (Note: the current millimeter-wave band Basically free, but the free band is not equal to millimeter wave band). In the strict sense of the millimeter wave frequency of 30GHz to 300GHz, corresponding to the wavelength of 10mm to 1mm, millimeter wave communication will greatly increase the rate of wireless data transmission. Earlier 5G new operating frequencies would be 28GHz (USA) and 39GHz (Europe), followed by other frequencies, such as 60GHz (Note, the communications industry is not optimistic about 60GHz due to the 60GHz signal propagation of atmospheric attenuation is more serious), 71GHz to 86GHz , May even use 300GHz.

To support millimeter-wave communications, mobile systems and base stations must be equipped with newer and faster application processors, basebands, and RF devices. In fact, the 5G standard has a great impact on radio frequency and requires a series of new RF chip technologies, such as millimeter-wave technology that supports phased antennas. Millimeter-wave technology first used in the field of aviation military, and now car radar, 60GHz Wi-Fi have been used in the future, 5G is bound to be used.

The introduction of millimeter-wave technology from the aerospace industry to the commercial market is not easy. "There are some challenges with millimeter-wave technology," said Peter Rabbeni, director of RF markets at GlobalFoundries. "Design and design implementations, as well as millimeter-wave product testing, are all going through a lot of difficulties, mainly because millimeter-wave frequencies are too high."

It is hard to design a millimeter-wave chip, but the test will be harder. "We've been testing millimeter-wave products very early in the industry, but these millimeter-wave chips are mainly used in the aerospace and defense market." Said Eric Starkloff, NI vice president of sales and marketing. "Millimeter-wave testing is costly and we are working hard Significantly reduce the cost of millimeter wave testing, so that it is possible to promote large-scale millimeter-wave. "

Although 5G technology faces many challenges, Verizon plans to offer some 5G services in the United States by 2017 while South Korea Telecom and Samsung plan to offer 5G services during the 2018 Winter Olympics, but large-scale 5G deployments will not be earlier than 2020. "I doubt very much that even if 5G can provide better mobile services by 2020," said Will Strauss, president of Forward Concepts. "Of course, there will be a 5G trial network providing high-speed mobile services in 2018, but then it will be able to buy Very few people get 5G mobile phone. "

Although there is still a long way to go before 5G realizes, the industry needs to carefully examine 5G technology to follow the development to the pace. Now we from the chip, technology, testing and packaging point of view a detailed analysis of the current status of 5G technology.

What is 5G?

What is 5G in the end? Why do we need 5G? Nowadays, most operators deploy the 4G mobile communication standard as the LTE Advanced (LTE Advanced, the 10th edition of the LTE standard, referred to as LTE-A for short). According to the 4G specification, operators deploy Cat 4 and Cat 6 LTE-A mobile communication networks, with LTE-A download speeds up to 150 Mbps and LTE-A download levels 6 Higher speed, up to 300Mbps.

In a while, operators will deploy LTE-A Pro (version 13 of the LTE standard), which is considered 4.5G technology and is seen as a stepping stone to 5G. According to National Instruments, LTE-A Pro supports 32 carrier units (LTE-A is 5), Massive MIMO and free-to-band LTE technologies. These technologies are part of the 5G technology, but 5G technology will further extend the operating frequency to the millimeter-wave band. For LTE-A Pro, operators will deploy Cat 10 mobile networks that support 450 Mbps download speeds and some will deploy Cat 16 mobile networks with download speeds of 1 Gbps.

Although 4G network is not bad at present, but according to Ericsson's estimate, from 2015 to 2021, the annual growth rate of mobile data flow is about 45%, by 2021 every mobile phone monthly data flow will increase from 1.4GB in 2015 to 8.9GB or so.

Because of the rapid growth of mobile data traffic and other reasons, people's demand for 5G technology is real. The 5G services provided by different operators may differ from each other, but in principle each of the 5G technologies selected by each operator includes the following three: Enhanced Mobile Broadband, Internet of Things and Machine Communication.

Enhanced Mobile Broadband introduces millimeter-wave technology that enables mobile data rates to exceed 10Gbps. 5G network capacity is more than 1000 times 4G, transmission delay reduced to one-tenth of 4G. Internet of things mainly refers to the technology based on wireless networks. In order to better develop the Internet of Things, the industry has also formulated a narrowband wireless Internet standard, becoming a narrowband Internet of Things (NBIOT). At the same time, the 5G includes a separate machine-to-machine communication protocol (M2M), and the M2M protocol specified in 5G is called LTE-M.

"The 5G calls for low power consumption and long battery life," said David Hall, National Instruments' chief marketing officer. "Both NBIOT and LTE-M are designed for machine-to-machine communication and are implemented on existing mobile communication protocols Modified, they are relatively simple RF. "

Where are the side effects of introducing these standards? Wireless technologies such as WiFi are all within the 5G concept, making the entire market complex, uncertain or even confusing. For example, 5G may include 60GHz wireless network technology (WiGig), other wireless standards are also emerging, such as LoRa and Sigfox.

However, it is unlikely (if not impossible) to design an RF chip that supports all wireless communications standards in all countries. "Can you satisfy all the requirements at the same time? No," said Thomas Camerson, chief technology officer of ADI's communications infrastructure division. Therefore, in the future, operators will only support some 5G standards. "The (carrier's) goal is to create a flexible network that can meet the needs of the fragmented vertical market," Camerson said.

In addition, compared to 4G, millimeter-wave signal transmission distance shorter, due to shorter wavelengths and air absorption and other factors, 5G signal propagation distance of about 200 meters. To meet the data traffic needs over short distances, 5G will use Massive MIMO to multiply system communications capacity by using multiple antennas. From this example you can see how complicated the 5G network is.

Perspective 5G phone

The digital part of the 4G handset includes an application processor and a modem, while the RF front end includes a power amplifier (PA), RF source and analog switch. Power amplifiers are used to amplify RF signals in handsets and are typically fabricated using Heterojunction Transistor (HBT) technology based on gallium arsenide (GaAs) materials. The future of 5G mobile phones also have application processors and modems. However, unlike 4G systems, 5G handsets also require phased array antennas. Phased array antennas consist of a set of antennas that transmit signals independently. With beamforming, each phased antenna can be redirected to a beam.

5G technology can become a reality, the key in the end where?

5G smartphone may need 16 with the antenna. "Each antenna has its own PA and phase shifter connected to a transceiver that covers the entire operating frequency," said Chris Taylor, an analyst at Strategy Analytics. "The ideal situation is to place the antenna above the transceiver , Or with the transceiver, so the transceiver must have multiple transmit channels made up of small PA's, and all incoming and outgoing signals are processed in the analog domain. "

Designing a system with millimeter-wave devices is very challenging. "Many customers are not only concerned with the architecture of the system, but also with what technology they really want to implement," said GlobalFoundries Rabbeni. "It depends very much on how much functionality your system integrates and how you divide the subsystems."

"In addition, placement and routing have a huge impact on the millimeter wave," said Rabbeni. "It's not easy to handle millimeter-wave circuits because the components are close together to reduce the loss." Phased array devices typically consist of different Technology, but now most of the standard CMOS process and silicon germanium (SiGe) process. "The silicon germanium process has been proven in millimeter-wave phased array / active antenna applications," said Amol Kalburge, senior strategic marketing director at TowerJazz. "In addition, SiGe materials integrate advanced CMOS processes with on-chip passive components, reducing the system-on-chip (SoC) footprint for increased integration and better balance of cost and performance, "Kalburge said." We think silicon germanium will play a big role in the 5G RF front-end IC, and of course other tri-valent materials. "

"In applications below 6GHz, switching of SOI processes will continue to be the mainstream, but the application of SOI switches at millimeter-wave frequencies is not well studied and its role and potential problems remain to be seen." Beamforming antennas Can support different receiving and dispatching channels, so it is possible to completely separate the two channels without the need for an antenna switch in the millimeter wave. If the millimeter-wave applications still require analog switches, the current SOI technology switch is likely to have high insertion loss Not available. The lack of SOI process will provide opportunities for MEMS process switches or other new technologies, "said Kalburge.

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