9.7 A Scalable 71-to-76GHz 64-Element Phased-Array Transceiver Module with 2×2 Direct-Conversion IC in 22nm FinFET CMOS Technology

Fifth-generation cellular communication standards (5G) target Gb/s data-rates, pushing the industry beyond the sub-6GHz bands. Tens of GHz of spectrum are available in the frequency bands from 30 to 300GHz. To maintain acceptable link budgets with sufficient antenna apertures, arrays are typically required at these frequencies and electrical beam steering is needed to retain spatial coverage. For such complex systems, highly-integrated, low-cost and energy-efficient SoCs are desirable to enable volume deployment. FinFET technologies are an ideal candidate to tackle this challenging integration, given the excellent balance between density and RF/mm-wave performance that has been recently demonstrated [1].