Introduction to the advantages of GaN, a key technology for realizing 5G

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Introduction to the advantages of GaN, a key technology for realizing 5G [Copy link]

With the advent of the 5G era, the market has more demands for small base stations. Along with this, there is a push to improve these base stations in terms of frequency, bandwidth, efficiency, etc. At the same time, the investment in technologies such as Massive MIMO, as well as the introduction of Sub-6Ghz and millimeter waves in terms of frequency, have brought new requirements to the design.

Operators hope to find an optimal solution in terms of operating costs, capital expenditures, reliability, and throughput for 5G base stations. Gallium nitride, which has the advantages of low power consumption, high power density, and long life, has become the choice of developers.

Let's first look at the application of PA design. In the application of PA, silicon carbide-based gallium nitride also shows its advantages. As shown in the figure below, the characteristics of silicon carbide-based gallium nitride have good performance in PA bandwidth, efficiency, power and thermal conductivity.

Let's take a look at the advantages that GaN brings to 5G. There are four main points:

1. In terms of life cycle, it is superior to other processes such as gallium arsenide.

2. It can make PA smaller and more efficient.

3. It can bring more advantages to LNA and switch. Based on these devices, developers can achieve higher integration and easily integrate front-end devices into a standalone MMIC.

4. The comparison of different PA efficiencies illustrates the improvement of GaN devices in base stations in millimeter wave applications.

GaN will undoubtedly become a key technology in 5G applications. This is just a brief introduction. If you want to know more, click to read the original article .