A 109–137 GHz power amplifier in SiGe BiCMOS with 16.5 dBm output power and 12.8% PAE

Abstract

This paper presents a 3-stage differential cascode power amplifier (PA) for 109–137 GHz applications. At 120 GHz the circuit delivers 16.5 dBm saturated output power with 12.8 % power-added efficiency (PAE) without using power combining techniques. The chip was fabricated in 130 nm SiGe BiCMOS technology offering heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBT) with fT If max of 300/500 GHz. The PA consists of three stages optimized accordingly to the design goals. The first stage operates in class A to provide high gain while the two following stages are biased in class AB and deep class AB in order to increase the efficiency. The circuit draws a maximum current of 100 mA from 3.3 V and 4 V supplies. It occupies only 0.24 mm2 chip area excluding baluns and bondpads, which makes it attractive for future power combiners. The presented amplifier is suitable for radar applications, that require a high dynamic range.