Anritsu Techtime Tour Visits Boston Area

I attended the Anritsu Techtime Tour this week (co-sponsored by AWR) since it was in our neighborhood in Chelmsford, MA. The Techtime Tour is a complimentary full-day educational seminar focused on the applications of Vector Network Analyzers (VNAs). Presentations included both lecture and live demonstrations presented by industry experts and allowed everyone to ask questions.

The topics covered were:

• VNA Fundamentals


• Advanced Amplifier Design and Test Including Nonlinear Measurements


• Advanced Time Domain Techniques


• Co-Simulation with Real-Time Channel Measurements

The session covered everything from the basics to the more advanced subjects in the afternoon so there was something for everyone. This was the last stop of the 6 city tour which included 2 stops in CA, 2 in TX, NJ and the Greater Boston. There are typically around 50 people who attend these sessions and if this tour is successful, they will try to continue having them from time to time.

I met one very interesting guy there who had his own personal VNA in his backpack. I was curious to see what he was using and he told me it was a VNWA which can be purchased as an assembled kit online for about 400 pounds from SDR-kits.net in the UK. It works up to about 1.3 GHz and he showed me the unit in action by measured a homemade filter he had rigged up. It is only 10.4 x 8 x 4.6 cm weighing 0.2 kg. A far cry from the VNAs sold by Anritsu but it is an interesting product.

Anritsu does have a big announcement for its VNA product line being released for IMS MTT-S so catch the news on the MWJ Online Show Daily.

MWJ Article Forecasts Technology used to Report Bin Laden Operation

Around the time last year when the Obama administration was first learning about bin Laden’s where-abouts in Abbottabad Pakistan, we at the Journal were putting the final touches on our August Military Microwave supplement. While the Journal and its staff has no obvious connection to the administration, military and intelligence community behind this successful covert operation, we do have a connection to this story by way of an article we were about to publish that month. The previous fall at the Milcom show in Boston, I had read an article by Dr. Simon et. al. of Queen’s University in Belfast on millimeter-wave ad hoc personal communication system for war fighters. I had invited Dr. Cotton to author the cover story for our Military supplement and he along with William Scanlon (Queen's University of Belfast), Efstratios Skafidas (University of Melbourne) and Bhopinder Madahar (Ministry of Defence, UK) graciously accepted our offer. The article was entitled, “Millimeter-wave Stealth Radio for Special Operations Forces”.

The Abstract read as follows:
For Special Operations Forces, an important attribute of any future radio will be the ability to conceal transmissions from the enemy while transmitting large amounts of data for situational awareness and communications. These requirements will mean that military wireless systems designers will need to consider operating frequencies in the mm-wave bands. The high data rates that are achievable at these frequencies and the propagation characteristics at this wavelength will provide many benefits for the implementation of ëstealth radioí. This article discusses some of the recent advances in RF front-end technology, alongside physical layer transmission schemes that could be employed for millimeter-wave soldier-mounted radio. The operation of a hypothetical millimeter-wave soldier-to-soldier communications system that makes use of smart antenna technology is also described.

I thought of these high speed data communication networks when I heard that the White House and operation leaders were watching the action in Pakistan unfold in real-time. After years of developing microwaves for weapon systems created and used during the Cold War, perhaps older Microwave Journal readers are well accustomed to knowing the technology story behind the headlines, but it still gives me the chills when it happens. I invite everyone to go back and read Dr. Cotton’s article now that it has moved from science fiction to forecast to fact.

Read: Millimeter-wave Stealth Radio for Special Operations Forces

Stealth Technology is Being Applied Everywhere

We learned last week that Navy SEALs probably used advanced technology on the Sikorsky choppers used in the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound in Pakistan. Military aviation experts have been poring over photographs of the debris (photo courtesy of Reuters), particularly the tail section, of the Black Hawk that had a hard landing and was purposely destroyed to protect its technology.

Exactly how the Black Hawk helicopters were modified is not completely known, but the photographs of the wreckage offer new clues to the military's cutting-edge methods. Several analysts agreed the aircraft used technology that appeared to stem from the Comanche, a $39 billion, joint project between Sikorsky and Boeing until it was scrapped in 2004 due to high costs. The tail rotor was modified with a dish covering part of the rotor to suppress noise and the tail section was modified to reduce it radar cross section. In addition, there was evidence of radar absorbing materials being used on the Black Hawks.

Also last week, Boeing announced that its Phantom Ray unmanned airborne system (UAS) successfully completed its first flight April 27 at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. This is a stealth unmanned platform which is obvious from its shape. The 17-minute flight took place following a series of high-speed taxi tests in March that validated ground guidance, navigation and control and verified mission planning, pilot interface and operational procedures. Phantom Ray flew to 7,500 feet and reached a speed of 178 knots.

The flight demonstrated Phantom Ray's basic airworthiness, setting the stage for additional flights in the next few weeks. These company-funded flights will prepare Phantom Ray to support potential missions that may include intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; suppression of enemy air defenses; electronic attack; strike; and autonomous air refueling.

Stealth technology is being applied to most combat aircraft built in the US these days, so it is a pretty safe prediction that all future US combat aircraft will be built using stealth technology and might even be all unmanned going forward.

Can RF Benefit from 3D Transistor Technology?

The buzz this week was of course the big announcement from Intel that all their new processors will use 3D transistor technology. Their "Tri-Gate" transistor that will allow the company to keep shrinking chips and keep up with Moore's Law which for a while looked to be an impossibility in the near future. Intel says the transistors will use 50 percent less power, conduct more current and provide 37 percent more speed than their 2D transistors while only adding an estimated 2-3 percent cost to existing silicon wafers. This isn't future technology any more as Intel says the it will be used its 22nm Ivy Bridge CPUs, going into mass production in the second half of the year and going forward on future platforms.

If you have not already seen it, the Tri-Gate transistor is really a FinFET which was invented about 10 years ago. The gate metal wraps around the active channel on three sides of the fin like structure of Si allowing it to better control the current. It has less leakage in the off state and allows better current flow in the on state making the FET more efficient. Here is the nice video Intel released showing how it works.



FinFET transistors suffer from stronger device parasitics compared to planar bulk transistors and tend to have lower cutoff frequencies. However, the improved performance of FinFET transistors is motivation for more work in this area, especially for reducing power consumption. There have been some papers on RF FinFETs - many of them on dual gate structures instead of Tri-Gate but the results seem limited. Has anyone seen some more recent work with RF FinFETs/Tri-Gate devices?

Weather Radar Technology Captures Tornado Activity

The devastating tornadoes last week were tragic, but I saw some amazing photos of the intense storms while watching the news. Many of these photos and animations are enabled by advanced radar technologies that our industry has developed.

One NASA platform that provided vital information is the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM). The TRMM has several instruments including a Precipitation Radar that was the first space borne instrument designed to provide 3D maps of storm structure. These measurements yield information on the intensity and distribution of the rain, on the rain type, on the storm depth and on the height at which the snow melts into rain. It can provide vertical profiles up to 12 miles and detect fairly light rain rates down to about .027 inches per hour. The Precipitation Radar uses a frequency 3 times higher than similar ground based systems in order to obtain high resolution images. It uses 128 solid state power amplifiers to provide a robust design and minimize power consumption (it only uses 224 W). As the beam size is small, it also utilizes scanning phased array technology to steer the beam over the target area.

The TRMM also has a Microwave Imager (TMI) whichi is a passive microwave sensor designed to provide quantitative rainfall information over a wide swath under the TRMM satellite. By carefully measuring the minute amounts of microwave energy emitted by the Earth and its atmosphere, TMI is able to quantify the water vapor, the cloud water, and the rainfall intensity in the atmosphere. The TMI measures the intensity of radiation at five separate frequencies: 10.7, 19.4, 21.3, 37 and 85.5 GHz. Calculating rainfall rates from TMI requires fairly complicated calculations using Planck’s radiation law, which describes how much energy a body radiates given its temperature.

The primary instruments for measuring precipitation are the Precipitation Radar, the TMI, and the Visible and Infrared Scanner. Additionally, TRMM carries the Lightning Imaging Sensor and the Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System Instrument. These instruments can all function individually or in combination with one another. TRMM is part of NASA’s Mission to Planet Earth, a long-term, coordinated research effort to study the Earth as a global system. The following images and description were taken from the NASA website:



The TRMM satellite saw severe weather over the eastern United States for the third day in a row on 27 April 2011. TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI) and Precipitation Radar data from this orbit shows numerous intense thunderstorms stretching from Louisiana to the Ohio valley. By 2:53 PM, four tornadoes had been reported as this stormy weather moved through Alabama and Mississippi (Images and Captions by Hal Pierce - SSAI/NASA GSFC).

Ground radar systems have added the capability to create very detailed 3D images of severe weather. One reason for this is the use of dual polarization radar. The images and descriptions below were taken from an article written by Jason Samenow in the Washington Post:


Radar sequence of tornado supercell thunderstorms that tracked from western Mississippi into southwest North Carolina. (Brian Tang, a post doctoral research fellow at the National Center for Atmospheric Research)

It is a Radar montage of the most impressive supercell from the large tornado outbreak. This cell traveled about 450 miles and lasted over 8 hours. It also was responsible for the large, violent tornado that caused the destruction in Tuscaloosa. The National Weather Service reported that the tornado spawned by this supercell from Tuscaloosa to Birmingham was on the ground for 80 miles and reached high-end EF-4 intensity (winds to 190 mph).


Vertical cross section of radar when tornado was in the vicinity of Tuscaloosa, Alabama on April 27. (@iwitnessweather and The Weather Channel via Twitter)

The above three-dimensional radar image shows not only the hook echo across the horizontal plane but also see the “debris” generated by the tornado right as it’s in the vicinity of Tuscaloosa. The debris is depicted by the “ball” of pink (indicating the high reflectivity) at the point of the hook echo. In the vertical, you can see the radar’s reflection of the actual funnel.

These newer tools should help scientists learn more about these storms and improve our warning systems. All these images and capabilities enabled by RF engineering!

M2M App Developers Projected to See Lower Module Prices

According to ABI Research, Mobile operators AT&T and Sprint have recently struck deals with cellular embedded module vendors to provide modules for M2M (machine-to-machine) application developer partners at discounted rates. Their goal is to encourage app developers to embrace 3G – and now 4G – M2M modules.

The M2M market largely consists of low data rate, low data consumption applications where 2G technology is perfectly adequate. Given a choice, M2M application developers would prefer to stay with older technology that is not only adequate from a connectivity standpoint, but more optimized from a cost component standpoint. In 2010, a 2G GSM/GPRS cellular embedded module cost approximately $18, while a 3G WCDMA module was roughly $65.

ABI Research forecasts that as WCDMA module shipments grow from less than four million last year to more than 62 million in 2016, ASPs will fall by more than half, approaching $30 in 2016. According to ABI Research practice director Sam Lucero, “The operator-module vendor deals we are seeing today may cause that ASP to be reached much sooner for the overall WCDMA market.”

The operators, in contrast, want all data devices on the network to use the most spectrally efficient technology – 3G or even 4G rather than 2G. “It makes sense for the mobile operators to do whatever they can to facilitate adoption of 3G/4G technology by the M2M ecosystem,” notes Lucero. “The AT&T/Sprint deals are examples of just such symbiosis: large mobile operators using their size to benefit typically much smaller M2M application developers.”

AT&T is working with Ericsson, Huawei and ZTE (the latter two being leading China-based module vendors) while Sprint has selected Fusion Wireless, an innovative new CDMA-focused module vendor based in San Diego, California.

I still think companies deploying these systems will be very cost driven so it will be a hard sell for the operators to force companies to use newer technology where the module cost will always be higher. The incentives will have to be substantial for them to adopt 3G/4G technology.

FCC Decision Could Lead to Interference Among GPS Receivers

Coalition Warns Recent FCC Decision Could Harm U.S. Economy and Exports. Threat of GPS Interference Could Have Unintended Consequences

As the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology begins its in-depth examination of spectrum issues, the Coalition to Save Our GPS submitted a detailed statement warning that a recent FCC decision that may disrupt the Global Positioning System(GPS) could have the unintended consequence of giving the Chinese, Russians, and Europeans competitive and economic advantage over the United States.

The “Coalition to Save Our GPS” is working to resolve a serious threat to the Global Positioning System. The threat stems from a recent decision by the FCC to grant a conditional waiver allowing the dramatic expansion of terrestrial use of the satellite spectrum immediately neighboring that of GPS, potentially causing interference to millions of GPS receivers. The FCC granted the conditional waiver for a proposal to build 40,000 ground stations to a company called LightSquared.

A portion of the Coalition’s statement follows:


“The Global Positioning System has stimulated a multi-billion dollar global industry that contributes both to the domestic economy and to U.S. exports. However, the Chinese, Russians, and Europeans are all developing their own GPS systems. If the rest of the world concludes that the U.S. system is compromised by interference, those other powers are ready to step forward to assume global leadership in this critical and highly sensitive area.

“LightSquared's proposal to build 40,000 terrestrial base stations operating at 1 billion times the power levels of GPS signals as received on Earth represents a tectonic change in the use of the L- Band. While the GPS community supports efforts to add new broadband competition and free up spectrum for mobile uses, this must be done in the context of rational, long term spectrum planning, rather than the rushed, ad hoc waiver process followed by the FCC to date. Spectrum is a public asset and it should not lightly be handed over at the behest of a private party. More fundamentally, the laws of physics cannot be waived by the FCC. The placement of LightSquared’s high-powered ground-based network in the middle of a satellite band full of weak and distant signals is a recipe for massive interference.”

Members of the Coalition include the Aeronautical Repair Station Association (ARSA), Air Transport Association (ATA), Aircraft Electronics Association (AEA), Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA), American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO), American Car Rental Association (ACRA),American Congress on Surveying and Mapping (ACSM), American Council of Engineering Companies/Council of Professional Surveyors (ACEC/COPS), American Rental Association (ARA),Associated Equipment Distributors (AED), Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM), Avidyne Corporation, Case New Holland, Caterpillar, Deere & Company, Edison Electric Institute (EEI), Equipped to Survive Foundation, Inc. (ETSFI), Esri, Farm Equipment Manufacturers Association (FEMA), Garmin, General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA), Hemisphere GPS, International Air Transport Association (IATA), Intelligent Transportation Society of America (ITS America), Leica, Mid-Atlantic Aviation Coalition-New Jersey (MAAC-NJ), National Agricultural Aviation Association (NAAA), National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), National Business Aviation Association (NBAA), Networkfleet, OmniSTAR, Orienteering USA, Payment Assurance Technology Association (PATA), PeopleNet, PocketGPSWorld.com Ltd, Regional Airline Association (RAA), TomTom, Topcon Positioning Systems, Trimble and UPS.

Assessing Japanese Quake Impact on GaAs Industry

Strategy Analytics issued a report today that the impact of the March 11 earthquake and ensuing tsunami, as well as the on-going issues with the nuclear reactors at Fukushima, are affecting the equipment and materials suppliers, consumer electronics companies, automotive, test and measurement companies in Japan. The Strategy Analytics' GaAs and Compound Semiconductor Technologies (GaAs) service report, “Japanese Quake Impact on the GaAs Industry,” contains a preliminary assessment of the impact of the tragedy on the global GaAs industry in Japan and throughout the world.

Strategy Analytics assessment of the situation indicates that there is no danger of immediate disruption to the supply of gallium and arsenide raw materials. The supply of SI (semi-insulating) bulk substrates will also be sustained. GaAs device manufacturing facilities were also largely unaffected. They state that the Japanese materials supplier were running at full capacity when the quake hit so if there was a surge in demand, shortages could result.

Japan is a leading player in the GaAs RF/microelectronics industry, accounting for 50 percent of bulk substrate supply, 18-20 percent of global SI GaAs epitaxial substrate production and up to one-fifth of the global GaAs device market. Japanese companies involved in the GaAs industry include Hitachi Cable, Renesas and Sumitomo Chemical.

TI to Acquire National Semiconductor

TI announced late yesterday that it is acquiring National Semiconductor. The purchase was for $25 per share in an all-cash transaction of about $6.5 billion and creates a combined product portfolio of 42,000 products.

Here is a letter Templeton wrote to stakeholders:

I am excited to let you know that TI has signed a definitive agreement to purchase National Semiconductor, uniting two industry leaders that have a common commitment to solving your analog needs. I want to reinforce TI's commitment to you, our customer, as we merge our two companies.

This acquisition will allow us to address your analog needs with a product portfolio of unmatched breadth and depth. National's 12,000 products plus TI's 30,000 means more performance, power and packaging options when selecting the right ICs for your application. And we'll provide a common set of best-in-class online tools to make the selection and design process easier.

Our combined sales and applications team of 2,500 will be larger than any in the industry so we can provide more customers with greater face-to-face support than ever before.

Our manufacturing operations will offer more capacity to support your growth. TI's fabs and National's available capacity can enable higher production levels.

While both companies will operate independently pending the close, our goal thereafter is to make the integration process as seamless as possible. No requalification of products will be necessary since National's manufacturing sites will continue to be utilized. Part numbers from both companies will remain the same. There will be no obsolescence of products.

I'm excited about what the integration of our two companies will mean for you: an unmatched portfolio to meet your analog needs, an extensive sales and applications network to ease the design process, and manufacturing capacity to support your growth.

You can learn more about the acquisition at www.ti.com/acquire, including answers to frequently asked questions and video messages from TI leaders regarding the acquisition.

Thank you for choosing TI. I look forward to a great future together.

Best regards,

Rich Templeton Chairman, President and CEO Texas Instruments

Active Antenna Markets Projected to Exceed $2 B by 2016

ABI Research released a new report last week that looked interesting to me. They stated that the global market for antennas for wireless infrastructure, including base station, fixed and active types, is set to reach almost $2.0 billion in 2016. So-called “active” antennas are the hot segment of this market. Widespread installations of active antennas, which combine the base station’s RF electronics in the antenna housing mounted at the top of the tower, have only begun quite recently.

According to research director Lance Wilson, “Active antennas offer a solution to the problem of rapidly growing wireless data traffic. Conventional designs are not as efficient; active antennas offer much greater efficiency and versatility when handling large quantities of signals, including wireless data.” Apart from the “active” segment, the antenna market can be described as stable and mature. “Market growth is gradual and steady,” says Wilson. ”That, along with the huge size of the market (from a component or subassembly standpoint), is precisely part of its appeal for vendors.”

The antenna vendor ecosystem is slightly unusual in that there are multiple tiers and many participants. The bulk of these vendors are small companies that command only fractional percentages of the total available market (why is that?). ABI Research believes that some market consolidation is likely. The scenario for active antennas is a bit different, with antenna manufacturers normally partnering with equipment builders.

Will 4G provide much stimulus to the antenna market? “Some upside is present with LTE/4G,” says Wilson, “but this will be moderated by the eventual decline in the GSM family of technologies. With the exception of still-developing regions, GSM infrastructure is largely built-out already. 4G won’t replace the millions of existing GSM base stations with similar quantities.”

I think antenna hardware and technology are overlooked in the most wireless markets as one of the more vital components of the system. Antenna articles are one of the most submitted types of articles we receive at Microwave Journal but few antenna manufacturers advertise or seem to be active at shows with the exception of the Satellite show.

In Aftermath of AT&T Buying T-Mobile: Apple Buys Sprint

In the latest deal in a wave of consolidation sweeping the wireless industry, Apple has announced it plans to acquire Sprint, and its stake in Clearwire. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed, but there is a provision in the deal for Apple to also buy out Clearwire's other investors, which include Google, Intel, and several cable firms. For Apple and Sprint, this deal represents a quick resolution to several long-term challenges facing each company. Sprint, which had been reeling in the wake of the AT&T/T-Mobile deal, gains the iPhone, the cash it needs to buy out Clearwire from its existing investors, and a needed psychological lift after years of being pummeled by customers, the media, and analysts. Dan Stressee (pronounced Stress-ee), Sprint's CEO, expressed delight at the news, saying: "I was looking at plowing all of the profits I was just starting to make again into lawyers and lobbyists to fight the AT&T deal. I met with Steve last week and we agreed that we'd prefer to focus on just selling a #$&%$load of phones." Steve ['creating lotsa'] Jobbs, seemed similarly ebullient. "Sprint completes us", he said, recognizing that a wireless network is "the only part of the value chain I don't already control." A network is a critical component of Apple's cloud strategy. The company is building a super-secret, underground, $1 billion data center in North Carolina, codenamed: Operation: Beat Google and Amazon At Their Own Game. "I realized that Sprint and Clearwire own a boatload of spectrum", said Jobbs. "Plus, by getting Sprint to throw in Clearwire, I take Google and the cable companies out of the picture as investors. So, Ha." Apple is going to need all of the spectrum it can get if it wants to offer cloud-based access to all of the music, apps, and video content to the hundreds of millions of devices it sells every hour. Despite his well-known disdain for telcos, Jobbs spoke highly of Sprint and Clearwire. "Combine them and you get "fast", and "simple", which is what we're all about." Apple, predictably, was not prepared to comment on its cloud strategy, though its CFO, Tim 'I can' Cooke, said in a recent interview that "we hope by 2013, our customers will never have to physically connect their iDevice to a computer again." Sources tell me the plan is called Operation Sync the Cable. Ironically, Jobbs and Stressee met, secretly, at the same bar near Redwood City where, nearly a year ago, Gizmodo's Jason Chen found an early version of the iPhone 4, mistakenly left there by an Apple engineer. "I needed to get those demons out of my system", said Jobbs. "Plus, I know that no Apple employee would ever set foot in the place again." The two men hit it off immediately. "Dan is clearly the best pitch man among the operator CEOs", says Jobbs. "I really like his folksy manner." In an immediate goodwill gesture, Apple will provide Sprint with a cash infusion, so its next round of TV commercials can be produced in color. "Yeah, it is 2011 after all", said the typically understated Stressee. Addressing concerns that there might be layoffs at Sprint/Clearwire, Jobbs said the severance package would include an iPad, and tickets to Disney theme parks and the upcoming Cars 2 (Jobbs is on the Disney and Pixar boards). "Who needs more than that?", said Jobbs. Customers Are Winners Customers are clearly among the winners in this deal. They'll be able to buy an iPhone from all the major U.S. operators. There were rumors that Apple wanted to make all future iPhones in the U.S. exclusive to Sprint, but Jobbs realized that this wouldn't pass muster with the DOJ. Given that he slipped by the feds, relatively unscathed, in the stock backdating scheme, Jobbs decided he didn't want to ruffle any feathers. One key benefit for consumers is that the Apple-Sprint deal solves the "CDMA iPhone problem" of not being able to handle voice and data calls simultaneously. A consumer can now talk on a Verizon iPhone with one hand, while running a data session on a Sprint iPhone with the other hand. In order to facilitate simultaneous voice and data, Verizon and Sprint, in an uncharacteristic moment of cooperation, will be offering a "Buy One Get One Free" (BOGO) deal on the CDMA iPhone for the next three months. Said a Verizon spokesperson: "I gotta admit - those AT&T ads are pretty effective." Reaction Across the Industry Needless to say, there was plenty of reaction from companies across the industry. Verizon was, particularly, peeved, having waited for three-plus years for AT&T's iPhone exclusivity to run out, only to then witness the T-Mobile and Sprint deals signed in a fortnight. The company plans to oppose the deal. Said a Verizon spokesperson: "We were content with 'Ruling the Air'. Apple wants to 'Rule The World'." AT&T, which thought it now had bragging rights to being the "biggest and baddest wireless carrier" in the country, said it did not plan to oppose the deal. "I'm a gambling man", said AT&T Mobility CEO, Ralph de la Vegas. "I'm bettin' on every smartphone platform - iOS, Android, Windows, Symbian, WebOS, BREW, BADA, you name it." True to form, the company is unveiling a new advertising slogan, 'if you want it, we've got it'. Google's stock took a major hit from the announcement. "We were so used to the operators spending billions of dollars to advertise Android phones", said George 'I am Not Helmut' Schmitt. "We might actually have to spend our own money to market the things." Asked what Google might do to get a leg up on Apple, one analyst commented that Google could improve the customer service experience for Android. But Schmitt said Google is sticking to its strategy: "I promise you, it will never be possible for an Android customer to call us and actually talk to a human being." In a related development, taking advantage of the mania around cloud services, Oracle announced that it would rename its Sun subsidiary, which had been underperforming of late, to...you guessed it... RIM, which has seen its stock slide precipitously amidst all the competition in smartphones, seemed prepared for an Apple-Sprint scenario. It has renamed all existing Blackberries "Blackberry Classic", hoping to put a retro spin on the messaging-centric devices. It has also been seen handing out Playbook flyers to all those standing in line for an iPad2. Amazon is clearly gearing up for a tectonic battle with Apple and Google over mobile services, apps, and the cloud. Emphasizing that it remains the only one-stop-shop on the Internet for just about anything, an Amazon spokesperson snipped: "let them find an app for that." Among the wireless and digital media giants, Netflix seemed perhaps the most perturbed. Said the company's CEO, Reid 'the battle of' Hastings: "Man, we've taken on video stores, Blockbuster, Redbox, Tivo, Hulu, Cable on Demand services. We thought it would be sufficient to offer all possible content across all possible media, to all possible devices, at an impossibly low price. But even that's not enough." Even though this is clearly the right move for Apple, the company is sensitive to possible regulatory and customer concerns about becoming too powerful. In one sign of humility, Apple has decided to rename its MobileMe product, which it has been revamping as part of its forthcoming cloud-based offering, to MobileYou. "We thought MobileMe sounded a bit egocentric", said an Apple spokesperson. Still, as Apple focuses on closing the Sprint deal, many analysts believe the much-anticipated iPhone 5 launch might be delayed until fall. Even though Apple rarely comments publicly about future plans, the Apple spokesperson hinted that there might be some validity to the rumors: "Listen, we still don't know if there will be a new Mad Men or NFL season. Focus on that." (Is it April 1st? - this April Fool's day spoof was provided by Mark Lowenstein's Lens on Wireless )

Strategy Analytics: Compound Semiconductor Market Cools Down

Strategy Analytics reported that after a strong rebound in the first part of 2010, revenue growth in the microelectronics segment of the compound semiconductor industry flattened in the final quarter. The recently published Strategy Analytics GaAs and Compound Semiconductors Service (GaAs) viewpoint, “Compound Semiconductor Industry Review January 2011: Microelectronics,” captures product, financial, contract and technology announcements for microelectronic companies such as RFMD, Skyworks Solutions, Hittite Microwave, ANADIGICS, Freescale Semiconductor, Microsemi and Cree for January 2010.

“Overall, the compound semiconductor industry rebounded strongly in 2010, thus slowing growth at some of the major suppliers in the fourth quarter should not be viewed with concern,” noted Eric Higham, Director of the Strategy Analytics GaAs and Compound Semiconductor Technologies Service. “The January announcements show significant product development activity that will serve to strengthen growth in 2011.”

Asif Anwar, Director in the Strategy Analytics Strategic Technologies Practice, added, “Results from some of the wafer suppliers were very strong and this also bodes well for growth throughout 2011.” Their viewpoint summarizes January 2011 financial, product, contract and employment developments from major GaAs and silicon suppliers addressing a variety of commercial and military applications using GaAs, GaN, SiC, and CMOS technologies.

CTIA Wireless Opens with a Bang

Of course, the biggest news at CTIA is the proposed merger of AT&T and T-Mobile. The keynote auditorium at CTIA Wireless was packed as everyone wanted to here what AT&T and T-Mobile executives had to say about their proposed $39 billion deal which would create the country’s largest wireless operator. AT&T understandably did not say much and T-Mobile was not there. But CEO Dan Hesse of Sprint expressed concern as he said there would be 79% market share in the top 2 providers so he has concerns it would stifle innovation if that much power was in the hands of two providers. That is a valid point and of course he message is that it is not a good idea.

The first day of the exhibition was busy but not overly packed and all the big players seem to be here. Lots of 4G phones and tablets but there seems to be significant activity with 3D devices which I did not expect but should have as CES was full of 3D electronics. The RF/Microwave Zone was our first priority as that is where many of the companies we cover are present. We are glad to welcome Infineon and NXP this year in addition to many other companies who have exhibited before. With Freescale also in the Zone, there is of course a major representation of high performance Doherty LDMOS amplifier technology. All are offering various configurations (symmetric, asymmetric and single package solutions). NXP and Freescale are offering a lower cost plastic package with up to 200 W of power which seemed unique. Also near the RF/Microwave Zone are the Backhaul Pavilion, M2M Zone and Test & Measurement Pavilion so we are in a perfect position. The test and measurement companies are featuring MIMO OTA and PIM testing solutions which are both very hot topics and areas of high interest. We are running the MIMO OTA Expert Forum on Thurs which will be simulcast online so anyone can attend. It will include a question and answer session after the presentations so you can even submit questions online if you are not here in Orlando.

We will have a complete show wrap up next week.

Tektronix Contest - "Scopes, Camera, Action”

To celebrate and highlight the beloved oscilloscope, Tektronix is introducing a “Scopes, Camera, Action” contest to showcase the many different uses for the instrument. Engineers, technicians, students and even electronic hobbyists will be invited to upload short 1-5 minute videos to MyTektronixScope.com about their most brilliant, novel, ingenious or fun use of a Tektronix oscilloscope.

Community members will have the opportunity to vote on their favorite “Scopes, Camera, Action” videos throughout the 8-week duration of the contest which started Feb 28. The person uploading the video that receives the most votes will receive a new Tektronix MSO2024 oscilloscope and each of two runners up will receive a TDS2024C oscilloscope. Each video entry qualifies the submitter for a chance to win an Apple iPad®.

Engineers by nature are a very creative group and Tektronix wants to give them the opportunity to showcase the cool uses they are applying to Tektronix equipment, whether that is in a work environment or in a garage shop or basement lab. Not only is this contest a nice way to win one of several great prizes but more importantly provides a mechanism to showcase great ideas and share best practices among the design engineering community.

To learn more about the “Scopes, Camera, Action” contest, or to upload, view or vote on videos, and review contest rules, visit www.mytektronixscope.com. Free registration to the site is required in order to participate.

Satellite 2011 is Taking Off

According to a release this morning, the 30th annual SATELLITE Conference has record attendance this year. More than 10,000 satellite communications professionals from 70 countries are at the event which continues today and tomorrow at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center located in Washington D.C.

The SATELLITE 2011 Exhibition has grown to include 325 companies, more than 60 of which are exhibiting at SATELLITE for the first time. In addition to enjoying the variety of products and services available on the show floor, attendees have enjoyed the outdoor exhibit area featuring large antennas, truck- and car-mounted satellite systems and more. I was excited about the outdoor exhibit but was somewhat disappointed that is only had 2 displays - hopefully it will grow next year.

The SATELLITE 2011 Conference began yesterday with chief executives from the world’s four largest satellite operators discussing the future of the satellite marketplace. Today’s general session is Competing For Customers: The MSS CEOs Speak Out.

The conference’s remaining sessions include High Throughput Satellites: Broadband and Beyond; A New Generation of MSS Terminals: What’s Next for MSS Equipment: Hosted Payloads: Thinking Outside the Box; 3-D TV via Satellite: Building Foundations for Success: Earth Observation- A Luxury Item or a Commodity?; How Can Commercial Satellite Providers Best Meet Government Requirements for COTM?; Satellites and Broadcasting: A 30-Year Warning, among many others.

There are a large number of RF/microwave companies here ranging from T&M to antennas to components. There are a very large number of filter and high power amplifier companies represented along with the system companies like L-3, Cobham, Rockwell Collins, Boeing, GD, LMC, Hughes, Thales, EADS, etc. We will do a complete wrap up of the show in a few days and then it is on to CTIA next week. Hopefully I will have time for a few videos today and will try to include those also.

Internet for Everyone - FREE

About a year ago Kosta Grammatis contacted Microwave Journal about satellite and communications experts he might contact to start an effort to supply Internet to everyone in the world for free. A huge challenge but a great idea and if anyone can pull it off, he can. He is now part of BuyThisSatellite.org which says it'll take $150,000 in contributions to take the first step toward a successful bid on the bankrupt Terrestar-1 satellite (they will probably need over 10 times that much to purchase the satellite plus costs to supply modems and maintain the whole system). After obtaining the satellite, they plan to move its orbit to point over a poor country in order to supply Internet access for free.

The group also plans to manufacture and distribute cheap satellite modems to get people hooked up on the ground. A lot of other things will have to be overcome but countries like Papua New Guinea—which has an open orbital "slot" which the Terrestar-1 could move into—only has Internet access for 2.1% of its population and would be the first to benefit from this effort. Terrestar-1 is a school bus-sized satellite (launched in 2009) that is for sale as its corporate owner is going bankrupt. But rather than let it go to waste, this non-profit is raising money to re-purpose it as a free Internet provider for the poor.

The organization believes that "Internet access is a tool that allows people to help themselves - a tool so vital that it should be considered a universal human right. Imagine your digital life disconnected. Without access to the 100 million man-hours that have been put into Wikipedia, how much do you actually know? Without your contacts online social networks how much can you accomplish? Without access to the news, weather, your bank account-- how in charge of your life are you?The Internet has transformed what it means to be human - we are now more connected to one another than ever before. Yet, over 5 billion people do not have access to this incredible invention, do not have a voice in the global dialog, or the opportunity to share ideas and learn from the Internet's ever-expanding knowledge pool.We believe that access to information and the Internet is a necessity for every global citizen and We plan to address the information inequality by making Internet access so ubiquitous you can take it for granted: Free, global, seamless connectivity."

They have a concrete plan spelled out on their web site:

PHASE 1
Our goal is to raise $150,000 USD to do the following: 1. Finalize a business plan for large scale funders. 2. Process the legal and business aspects of submitting a bid for the satellite. 3. Hire several full-time engineers to make our calculations and planning into a concrete reality. While this work is in process we will meet with investors, businesses, governments, and foundations who are interested in funding the purchase of Terrestar-1. Partnerships will be created with the country or countries over which the satellite will be positioned. When our plan is funded we will.

PHASE 2
1. Make an official bid for the Terrestar-1 satellite. 2. Begin development of an open source low cost modem. 3. Acquire an orbital slot (satellite parking spot) and spectrum (radio wave allocation). 4. Finalize plans with partner governments. 5. Continue all of the technical work required to reposition a satellite.When all of these details are finalized we will continue,

PHASE 3
1. Move the satellite to a new orbit over our partner country/countries. 2. Distribute low cost modems. 3. Roll out service.

They are asking for donations so if you agree that this is a worthy cause, please visit their website at http://www.buythissatellite.org/.

TriQuint and Skyworks Power iPhone 5

The upcoming Apple iPhone 5, due this summer, will be powered by TriQuint and Skyworks PAs. While it is disappointing that it will not have 4G LTE capability, according to an article from The Street about TriQuint, the Apple iPhone 5 will be a full featured world phone equipped with "seven power amplifiers" to improve the wireless reception on the full array of WCDMA and EVDO frequencies in the U.S. and Europe, says Rodman Renshaw analyst Ashok Kumar. This is good news for power amp supplier Triquint, which was left out of the Verizon iPhone 4 this year.

The Street goes on to say that Triquint is back in the iPhone 5 and sharing power amp supply duties with rival Skyworks. "We expect Triquint to gain share and outgrow most of its peers in mobile phones, while improving margins," according to Charter Equity Research analyst Ed Snyder. Snyder says chipmaker Triquint is in a sweet spot as phone makers push for better wireless performance.



Apple's move to improve its wireless reception performance comes after three rough years of complaints about poor service at AT&T. And as industry experts have pointed out, not all of Apple's iPhone connection quality issues were due to AT&T. Apple's effort to design the iPhone to use less power apparently caused some unintended effects with signal jamming. The iPhone was recently released on Verizon and while there does not seem to be major reception complaints, Consumer Reports has said that their tests show the Verizon iPhone 4 version still has some antenna issues when the antenna element gaps is bridged by holding it.

RFMD, Skyworks and TriQuint continue to dominate the cellular front-end market ast the big three but Avago and Anadigics are fighting for larger market share. We are seeing a lot of innovative changes coming in the front-end modules as different configurations are being developed including new switch technologies such as SOI/SOS switches, miniature BAW filters, tunable devices such as MEMS and others, and wide band power amps that can support multiple bands. It will be interesting to see how these technologies play out over the next year or so.

MWC - the week after

Everyone who "does" trade shows knows how a week away from the office and three days of back to back meetings can put you in the weeds. So while Richard Mumford and I have posted our show wrap-up and impressions earlier this week, I've been playing catch up on a number of fronts, including at least one more intended blog about events from Mobile World Congress. So here's some more on what we did not cover so far. For the complete Journal coverage of MWC try the links below.


MWC news and twitter feed
http://www.mwjournal.com/Article/MWC2011/AR_10287/

see Richard's wrap-up
http://www.mwjournal.com/News/article.asp?HH_ID=AR_10365

David's MarketWatch
http://www.mwjournal.com/News/article.asp?HH_ID=AR_10370

My networking started Sunday, the day before my first day at MWC, in an Irish bar on La Rambla where we met VP of Sales John Loia and Kevin Dobis, American/EMEA Director of Sanjole. Chances are that during MWC week, if the person next to you in a restaurant or bar isnt a native, they are there for the congress. John and Kevin were great guys to hang with (and sing anthems with under pressure for the Irish), but they also represent an interesting company, Sanjole. Turns out that John is an old hand in the industry with over 20 years experience selling telecom test equipment to chip manufacturers, network equipment manufacturers and service providers and tenure at well-known industry leaders such as Spirent Communications, TTC and Hekimian.

Sanjole makes the WaveJudge WiMAX and 3GPP LTE test system. This test system determines what messages were sent, what events occurred, and the timing of those messages and events. Diagnosing the root causes of problems between layers often takes hours, days or even weeks, resulting in delays in certification, late deployment, reduced credibility, added costs and lost revenue for network providers.

The WaveJudge 4900 architecture supports four independent ports. Each can be configured as either a receive (RX) or transmit (TX) port, supports AGC to allow accurate reception of DL/UL signals with a wide range of power levels, and has its own radio and internal resources. In addition, the ports can be driven either from the same or from separate low-noise highly accurate oven-controlled crystal oscillators (OCXOs), providing maximum flexibility in test configurations requiring multiple ports, such as:

• Tower handover


• Multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) solutions including transmit diversity, spatial multiplexing, and UL Collaborative with rank measurements


• Co-channel interference across multiple sectors

Check out the company and their products at: http://www.sanjole.com/index.htm

here's a summary of meetings that did not make the show wrap-up

Monday Afternoon

- meeting with Steve Caliguri of Acorn Technologies. Steve is now out in sunny La Jolla California but he's an ex-east coaster with plenty of knowledge about the microwave industry nestled on and around Route 128 in Massachusetts. As VP of Biz dev, Steve wanted to introduce me to the company's HellaPHY technology a set of advanced signal processing algorithms designed to improve the reception of OFDM, the digital modulation scheme of WiMAX, LTE and Wi-Fi by significantly improving the channel estimation.

HellaPHY allows for equal-or-higher modulation-coding sets at any given point in a cellular network. For example, at some location a modem using a conventional OFDM PHY may only allow for QPSK due to high mobility and interference from other users. At this same point in the cell, a modem using an OFDM HellaPHY™ can allow for higher-rate 16-QAM or 64-QAM. Such gains in capacity can greatly impact an operator’s bottom line, and such improvements in data rate allow for attractive product differentiation.

see more at: http://acorntech.com/

- met with Skyworks and Thomas Richter, Sr. marketing director for Front-end solutions. I run into Thomas yearly at MWC, he is a knowledgable and colorful guy with no shortage of opinions about technology and market trends... and the shortcomings of his competitors, which we will keep off the record. Its always a pleasure to spend some time with Thomas and so I was happy to save this meeting for the end of the day, when I wouldnt have to rush off to another meeting.

The company's big show announcement was the introduction of a new family of antenna switch modules (ASM) for dual- and triple-mode smart phones, tablets and datacards. These devices are based on both gallium arsenide (GaAs) and silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technologies, targeting a wide range of applications from low-cost 3G handsets to HSPA+/LTE-enabled datacentric devices such as high-end smart phones, data dongles and tablets, all of which require design flexibility, high performance and cost-effective architectures.

The short of our market conversation was that the RF front-end for mobile device market is extremely strong with enormous growth potential and fabs cranking at full speed to keep up with demand.

to be continued....

Mobile World Congress - Bueno Dias

From our hotel just off La Rambla in the heart of Barcelona, Publisher Carl Sheffres, European editor Richard Mumford and I take the metro to Place Espanya among a sea of black suits, which must be the official business attire color for those attending Mobile World Congress. At the top of the salida (exit), we stop for a quick photo opportunity. Anticipating a mob at the registration desk (attendance estimates are north of 50,000 attendees) each of us had already obtained our passes the day before and so with passes in hand the three of us glide past the front gate security.

Mobile World Congress is one of those mega-events on par with Electronica in terms of scope and size, CES in terms of style and cool factor. The congress is devoted to all things mobile, which has transformed from the early days of cell phones to today’s smart phones and is evolving toward a future that connects the entire planet to the internet via mobile devices. Connected tablet devices, cloud computing, HD and 3D mobiles and some seriously powerful processors being stuffed into mobile devices dominated much of the tech news coming out of the show. Partnerships (Nokia adopting Microsoft’s window platform 7 – WP7), more accessible social networking mobility, gaming, mobile banking and lifestyle were among the themes delivered by various keynote speakers throughout the week.

Among all the new devices, services, and applications that were unveiled and opportunities for connecting mankind in previously unfathomable ways that were envisioned over the course of the week, one underlying concern will be the challenges behind fixing the “capacity crunch” as demand continues to grow. Many conversations in the various exhibition halls were focused on this less glamorous but real problem of optimizing the use of available spectrum to support the connectivity dream.

For many of us in the microwave trenches, this eco system of user devices, cell equipment and backhaul represents our end customers. The majority of exhibiting companies that Microwave Journal readers would recognize include RF test and measurement manufacturers, front-end semiconductor and module vendors, filter and backhaul equipment providers. The high cost of exhibiting at this event may have kept other microwave categories from appearing in an official capacity, but I would not be surprised if more component, cable and connector folks were working the exhibition floor as attendees.

Day one
First meeting - Agilent. The Test & measurement powerhouse are well-prepared for their day of press and customer meetings with a presentation touching upon the past, present and future of mobile communications and their part in this unfolding story. In their booth the company was demonstrating test and measurement solutions for 3GPP LTE-Advanced, LTE, W-CDMA, HSPA+, E-EDGE (EDGE Evolution), UMA/GAN, WiMAX™ and femtocells.

With an eye on what’s to come, team Agilent is prepared to talk about the challenges of LTE-advanced. With a lock-down of features in the 3GPP release 10 standard scheduled for sometime in March, Agilent is looking to get ahead of the curve with providing test solutions. LTE-A at a glance will introduce carrier aggregation, clustered SC-FDMA (for enhanced uplink multi-access) and higher order MIMO. Several products have been enhanced for the challenges of the new standard including LTE-Advanced signal generation and analysis tools, Signal Studio and 89600B vector signal analysis (VSA) software which were shown performing both user equipment and eNB RF measurements.

Other solutions being shown: Agilent’s PXB baseband generator and channel emulator supporting MIMO test performance in real-world conditions, closely characterizing end-user environments. Agilent PXT wireless communications test set supporting development phase testing ( RF characterization, protocol test and functional test of LTE user equipment). This solution is highly scalable from a single PXT on the developer’s bench to a full conformance test system with the latest release supporting user equipment performance tests during handover between LTE and legacy technologies. Test automation tools are also available.

more day one (and the rest of the show) to come....

Microsoft and Nokia to Join Forces in Smartphone Market

ABI Research has commented on the fact that Nokia has announced this sweeping and profound change in its strategy. Accepting that the Symbian operating system cannot meet the needs of today’s smartphone consumer, Nokia has opted to throw in its lot with Microsoft and use the Windows Phone 7 operating system in future Nokia smartphones. In addition, the Nokia devices unit has been split into two business units that will address smartphones and low cost phones separately. I have heard rumblings about this partnership but thought it would take more time to pull it off with these two giants.

The sweeping changes made at Nokia will begin immediately and likely take two years to be completely digested as the two technology giants try to merge their mobile service ecosystems and product development roadmaps. ABI Research VP Kevin Burden states, “With Nokia taking over the Windows Phone 7 universe, the other OEMs who have initially supported Window Phone 7 may rethink their commitment, and eventually end support of Windows Phone 7 the way they did with Symbian, due to Nokia’s dominance and influence over the platform.”

The speed at which such a major decision was made speaks to the desperate situation Nokia CEO Stephen Elop perceived in Nokia’s device strategy. Senior Analyst Michael Morgan states “Elop’s decision to go with his old employer makes sense up front; however the decision to tie an incomplete operating system with an ailing handset design company is a very risky proposition.” Microsoft and Nokia need a strong partner to push their mobile efforts forward. While this alliance may not be optimal for either party, when fighting for survival it is always nice to have a partner.