Qualcomm's New RF Front End Chips Target LTE Band Proliferation

Qualcomm introduced a silicon Front End Solution that addresses cellular radio frequency band fragmentation.  The goal is to create a single, global 4G LTE design for mobile devices.

Qualcomm calls band fragmentation the biggest obstacle to designing global LTE devices.  There are some 40 cellular radio bands worldwide.

The Qualcomm RF front end solution seeks to mitigate this problem while improving RF performance and helping OEMs more easily develop multiband, multimode mobile devices supporting all seven cellular modes, including LTE-FDD, LTE-TDD, WCDMA, EV-DO, CDMA 1x, TD-SCDMA and GSM/EDGE.

Qualcomm's RF front end solution includes the first envelope power tracker for 3G/4G LTE mobile devices, a dynamic antenna matching tuner, an integrated power amplifier-antenna switch, and 3D-RF packaging incorporating key front end components.

“The wide range of radio frequencies used to implement 2G, 3G and 4G LTE networks globally presents an ongoing challenge for mobile device designers. Where 2G and 3G technologies each have been implemented on four to five different RF bands globally, the inclusion of LTE brings the total number of cellular bands to approximately 40,” said Alex Katouzian, senior vice president of product management, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. “Our new RF devices are tightly integrated and will allow us the flexibility and scalability to supply OEMs of all types, from those requiring only a region-specific LTE solution, to those needing LTE global roaming support.”

http://www.qualcomm.com