The Westinghouse high density microwave packaging program

The Westinghouse High Density Microwave Packaging (HDMP) Program investigates advanced packaging and interconnects for next generation Active Electronically Scanned Arrays (AESA's). Our teaming partners include TRW, IBM, and MCNC. The overall goal of the program is to develop appropriate designs, materials, and manufacturing processes that lead to the production of highly interconnected, very thin radar Transmit/Receive (T/R) modules with the following benefits (4:1 Cost Reduction, 10:1 Volume, Weight Reduction). Early on, interim demonstrations are planned to establish advanced packaging and interconnect processes of multiple T/R cell tiles. In the last two years of the program, these processes will be used to fabricate functional T/R cell hardware culminating with the delivery of 50 T/R cells. In this paper, the program objectives, schedule, and technologies are reviewed. >