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To: SKIP PAUL who wrote (22058)	1/27/1999 10:10:00 PM
From: Ruffian	Respond to of 152472

This Is Interesting> Electronica moves on packages and W-CDMA Microwave Engineering Europe At the first Electronica exhibition to be staged in Munich's brand new conference and exhibition centre, the test, device and package needs for wireless communications featured strongly. There were test products aimed at the next generation of cellular phones from companies such as Rohde and Schwarz and Anritsu and new RF transceiver chips highlighted by Gran-Jansen of Norway and [ Sony ] . Sony's Duetto GSM dual-band RF chipset includes a transceiver IC that covers 900/1800 or 900/1900MHz for dual-band cellular handsets. The company is also offering a 34.5dBm (at 3.6V) power amplifier and SP4T antenna switch to complete the set of chips, but 3 external VCOs and one IF SAW filter will also be needed. The outline data available in Munich claimed that the sum loop modulator in the transmit chain provides a sufficiently pure transmit output to ensure that simple harmonic filters can provide good enough performance after the power amplifiers. An otherwise conventional architecture is shown with a super-heterodyne receiver that uses a 440MHz intermediate frequency. A UMTS part is on the roadmap too. Gran Jansen is a less familiar name in semiconductors but this Oslo based Norwegian company, is offering transceiver chips for frequency hopping spread spectrum transmission of data at 433MHz and has now added a complete transceiver board to help with winning design slots for the chip, a module which it claims type approval for. The transceiver is specified for operation between 300 and 500MHz, operating from a single 2.7-3.3V supply and uses a direct conversion design for the receiver. In receive mode, the part requires 16mA, rising to 25mA in the transmit mode, with 5mW output power available, and falling to a power down current of 1 micro A. Transmission data rate is coding dependent but a typical figure of 9600bits/s is quoted. At the heart of the transmitter are the PLL, synthesizer and a power amplifier. The VCO is on board but does require an external resonator and varicap, joined off chip by the the loop filter for the synthesizer. A low noise amplifier kicks off the receiver chain, feeding into the twin quadrature mixers. At baseband, passive RC filters and gyrator filters follow variable gain amplifiers before the signals are limited and demodulated to produce a digital data output. Power consumption is a target specification for reduction and engineering samples for a part with the receiver current halved are expected this month Also in Munich with the introduction of a new module was TDK which is offering a dual band transceiver module for GSM900/1800 cellular handsets. The 45x35x6mm3 module is based around Hitachi's BRIGHT 11 dual-band transceiver chip and supports class 4, 2W operation at 900MHz and class 1, 1W operation at 1800MHz. Frequency spectrum The electro-mechanical side of the electronics business also wanted to show that it could produce new products for the event that pushed up the frequency spectrum. Teledyne's 12GHz SPDT switch was too recent a development to have complete data but, based on a test sample of 20 relays, Richard Sun, responsible for development of the new part in California, claimed that the unit could deliver better than 17dB return loss up to 10GHz with 0.2dB insertion loss up to 3GHz and better than 40dB isolation. By 12GHz, the insertion loss on the preliminary data has reached 0.6dB. Anritsu, [ Hewlett Packard ] and Rohde & Schwarz are all showing products aimed at the design labs for third generation cellular systems using wideband CDMA (W-CDMA). HP started the roll out on its products at the European Microwave Week, also covered on page 14 of this issue, but Rohde and Schwarz made full use of the home-ground location for showing new boxes at Electronica. These included two spectrum analyzers from the company's alliance with Advantest of Japan with IQ modulation and code-domain power analysis, a system package for generating W-CDMA signals. The company is claiming that it provides a capability to measure adjacent channel power ratios for the new systems of 75dB and cites ACPR as a key measurement parameter for the W-CDMA standard which has yet to be fully defined. Package improvements, or replacement in a conventional sense were also on show. [ National Semiconductor ] has been enthusiastic about flip-chip mounting of circuits and has just been chosen to lead a government/industrial project to develop better bonding materials for flip-chip mounting with major funding from the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). As a practical example of wafer level packaging, National showed a dual op-amp measuring 1.45mm square and with 0.9mm height in the so-called micro-SMD surface mount package, see figure 1. It has solder bumps along each edge on the active side of the circuit, making eight in total. Fujitsu is also pressing ahead with new packaging technologies including the bump chip carrier (BCC) for RF circuits. Having started with 0.65mm pitch, 16 pin versions which were compatible with standard SSOP packages, the company has moved down to a 0.5mm pitch, and with that pitch size comes 32 and 48 pin versions which are now available as mechanical samples. The BCC package size comes in 2mm larger than the basic die size. Test data from Fujitsu which compares the RF performance of the BCC package against the SSOP show the insertion loss 3dB point at 5.0GHz for the SSOP pushed up to 6GHz for the BCC. Next stage is a 64pin package, currently under development to handle large circuits. The new Munich conference centre, within the complex used for Electronica 98, will be home to the 2nd European Microwave Week from 4 - 8 October next year. R&S Tel: +49 89 4129 1765 Fujitsu National Semiconductor Tel: +49 8141 35 1 443 solveig.loesch@nsc.com Gran Jansen Tel: +47 22 12 42 00 granjan@online.no Sony Tel: +44 1256 38 8881 mobilecomms@sse.eu.sony.co.jp (Copyright 1999)

To: SKIP PAUL who wrote (22058)	1/27/1999 10:14:00 PM
From: Ruffian	Respond to of 152472

Ericsson Divests Lab> NEWS DIGEST: Ericsson divests lab Electronics Times Symbian is to take over Ericsson's Swedish mobile applications lab for an undisclosed sum. The deal is part of Ericsson's commitment, as a Symbian shareholder, to transfer appropriate technologies and staff for the development of the Epoc operating system. (Copyright 1999) ____

To: SKIP PAUL who wrote (22058)	1/27/1999 10:18:00 PM
From: Ruffian	Respond to of 152472

Mot, Lu, Nokia > Digital handsets boost Motorola Electronics Times [ Motorola ] has bought the assets of [ Lucent Technologies ] ' wireless handset R&D facility in Piscataway, New Jersey, for an undisclosed sum. The 300 engineers at the facility will now become Motorola employees. The move follows the failure of Lucent's joint venture in wireless handsets with Philips Electronics. That partnership ended last October, and Lucent took a $100m charge at the time in selling its consumer phone equipment business. Analysts say the move will help Motorola develop digital wireless handsets, a technology in which the team at Lucent was notably strong. * Nokia, Motorola's arch rival in the mobile handsets business, is investing $200m at its plant in Bochum, Germany, to increase capacity for cellular phones as worldwide demand continues to grow. Production at the plant, which employs 1500, will more than double as more assembly lines come on-stream in the next few months. (Copyright 1999)

To: SKIP PAUL who wrote (22058)	1/27/1999 10:22:00 PM
From: Ruffian	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 152472

Mobile Phone Stats> Mobile phone subscriptions surge in 1998 Electronics Times by Sandy Morrison Mobile phone operators are reporting record-breaking increases in UK subscribers, thanks largely to a Christmas boom in purchases of prepayment phones. Both Vodafone and Orange reported a growth of more than 80% in their customer base during 1998, with approximately half of that growth attributable to the last quarter. Vodafone connected 933,000 mobile phone customers in the last quarter of 1998, including 755,000 on its Pay as You Talk service and 500,000 in December alone. Orange now has more than two million subscribers, 960,000 of them gained during 1998 and 512,000 of those during the last quarter. Orange's Just Talk service is used by 22.5% of its subscriber base but 64% of those connected during the last quarter. Shares in both companies rose sharply following the announcement of these figures, as did shares in BT and Cable & Wireless, both of which have interests in mobile phone networks. But Vodafone has been ordered by the Independent Television Commission to withdraw its advertising for Pay as You Talk. The Commission considered the advertisements misleading as they fail to mention the need to keep up payments to retain network access. Keith Westcott, MD of Ericsson Mobile Phones UK, admits to being surprised by the extent of the surge in demand at the end of 1998. He expects rapid growth to continue because "once a market reaches 20% penetration, you have an acceleration in the use of mobile phones. This has been clearly seen already in the Scandinavian market." He feels that prepayment tariffs have created a different market segment as phones can be readily given to children or the elderly for emergency use. These packages mostly use basic models, but Westcott believes "a younger audience will want more features", and that many will upgrade to more expensive phones after 12 months or so. (Copyright 1999)

To: SKIP PAUL who wrote (22058)	1/27/1999 10:32:00 PM
From: Ruffian	Respond to of 152472

From Yahoo Ericy Thread> t - nothing new about my statement that Ericsson might be by: Kool_Operator 14202 of 14202 interested in Q or part of Q's business. This rumor has been out there for a few weeks. All I am doing, if the rumor is true, is to tie the layoffs with some kind of an agreement with Q. For any company to reduce their work force by over 10% is significant. This involves much more than out sourcing part of their manufacturing business. Something significant will be annouced tomorrow that has something to do with the layoffs and if it concerns Q, it may be an agreeement over 3G or possible purchase of part of Q's business. Or it may have nothing to do with Q. We will find out tomorrow and I hope it will resolve the battle over 3G. Kool