Tower and Jazz Semiconductor Offer Deep-Silicon-Via Technology for Power Amplifiers

Tower Semiconductor Ltd. and its subsidiary Jazz Semiconductor have reportedly announced that the proprietary Deep-Silicon-Via technology will be available in the 0.18-micron SiGe BiCMOS or SBC 18 power amplifiers.

 

The new product creates a low-inductance ground for reducing power consumption of power amplifiers. This is different from traditional Through Wafer Vias, which are suitable for smaller wafer sizes in GaAs-based technology. Company sources said that the DSV is optimized for silicon 8-inch wafers which help reduce the cost of a power amplifier.

 

Jazz developed the DSV technology, which uses equipment in its silicon CMOS wafer fabs and hence can be scaled to greater volumes eliminating the use of complex thin wafers that are difficult to handle and process.

 

“We continue to invest in foundry technology for the front-end module by enabling silicon solutions of components that have traditionally been built in GaAs, helping customers reduce cost and increase integration levels,” Dr. Marco Racanelli, senior vice president and general manager, RF and high performance analog business group, Tower and Jazz Semiconductor, said in a statement.

 

Racanelli said that this new DSV technology is a new offering in the company’s Silicon Radio Platform that includes SiGe power amplifiers and SOI-based silicon switch technology. The new technology allows a flexible layout than Through Wafer Via facilitating a smaller die size.

 

The Deep-Silicon-Via technology provides a very low parasitic inductance path to ground that is much lesser than Through Wafer Via inductance. This offers more versatility to designers involved in the PA design process. DSV also allows design features, which can provide the function of the emitter ballast resistor.

 

DSV also eliminates thin wafer processing steps which give less yield and are more expensive. This also improves linearity of gain and output power and provides a short path to ground for shunt tuning elements besides making it suitable for lateral shielding of circuit blocks, said company sources.  It is reportedly available to Jazz customers for its 0.18um SiGe BiCMOS process from the company Web site. Soon it will be available for other RF processes.

 

Tower Semiconductor specializes in Analog-Intensive Mixed-Signal foundry solutions and along with Jazz it manufactures integrated circuits ranging from 1.0 micron to 0.13 micron in dimensions, helping with the design and manufacture of complex product designs.