EuMW: Aspen brings custom MMICs to town

US-based developer of gallium arsenide (GaAs) monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs), Custom MMIC is represented in the UK by Aspen Electronics, and its microwave amplifiers, switches and mixers are on show this week at European Microwave Week (EuMW) in London.

These include a SP3T switch, the CMD234C4, which provides an isolation of 40dB at 10GHz and insertion loss of 2dB. The device includes an on board binary decoder circuit, requiring only two complimentary control voltage logic lines of 0/-5V.

A SP5T switch, the CMD235C4, similar to the SP3T design, features a low power integrated 3:8 TTL decoder for enhanced digital control. It provides insertion loss of 2.5dB and isolation of 40dB at 10GHz. Both devices are available in Pb-free RoHs compliant 4×4 SMT QFN packages, and have a switching speed of only 66ns.

A 22GHz GaAs MMIC amplifier has a noise figure down to 2.2dB and a gain of 15dB. The CMD240 demonstrates a 1dB compression point of 19dBm at 10GHz and an output IP3 of 28dBm with only 80mA supply current.

With slightly less current draw and a gain of 13.5dB from 2 to 22GHz, the CMD241 has a noise figure of 2.3dB. The CMD241 features enhanced output power performance with an output P1dB of 21dBm.

Both amplifiers are matched to 50 ohms, and the CMD241 includes on-chip DC block capacitors.

In applications with very small size and high linearity requirements, the CMD243 wideband balanced driver amplifier offers 15.5dB of gain and operates from 26 to 35GHz. The CMD243 also provides an output P1dB of 21dBm, a low noise figure of 4.4dB and is 50 ohm matched.