Product category: Communications ICs (Wireless)
News Release from: Zarlink Semiconductor | Subject: ZL20200
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial Team on 17 December 2002
Handset RF chip is first with send and
receive
Zarlink Semiconductor claims to have launched the world's most compact and cost-effective off-the-shelf cellphone radio chip for 2G digital networks.
Zarlink Semiconductor claims to have launched the world's most compact and cost-effective off-the-shelf cellphone radio chip for 2G digital networks Zarlink's ZLTM20200 - the first commercial device to successfully integrate call receive and transmit circuitry on the same silicon - slashes the size and cost of the radio portion of cellular telephones
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 14 Mar 2003 at 8.00am (UK)
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Zarlink's radio transceiver is targeted primarily at cell phones for 2G TDMA/AMPS digital cellular networks, which are deployed extensively across the Western Hemisphere.
Consumer demand for small, low-cost cell phones remains strong, driven by the rollout of new TDMA/AMPS networks in Mexico, Brazil, and other Central and South American countries.
North American TDMA/AMPS markets are also expanding, as consumers show renewed interest in attractively priced cell phones offering straightforward, good-quality voice services.
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Two of the world's leading cell phone manufacturers are currently evaluating Zarlink's ZL20200 radio chip for low-cost TDMA/AMPS handsets.
Zarlink's highly integrated transceiver eliminates at least 35 separate components, shrinking the radio "footprint" by up to 40% and reducing the bill of materials by up to 20%.
"The ZL20200 is the cornerstone chip designers need to build small, good quality, standards-compliant radios for TDMA/AMPS cellular handsets at low cost", said Derek Rye, Cellular Marketing Manager, User Access business unit, Zarlink Semiconductor.
"By designing the first commercially available TDMA/AMPS radio transceiver, Zarlink is setting a new industry benchmark for circuit integration".
Traditionally, cellular receive and transmit functions are implemented on two or more chips to ensure that sensitive RF front-end receive circuits are isolated from spurious signals and power surges in the transmit path.
Zarlink's ZL20200 uses advanced architectural partitioning and a high-performance, two-stage receiver design to overcome these isolation issues, enabling the integration of receive and transmit circuits on the same silicon chip.
The ZL20200's receiver mixes incoming IF voice signals with synthesised LO signals from an on-chip VHF VCO, and down converts them to the baseband frequency.
The receiver delivers 100dB of gain control, handles AMPS FM demodulation, and includes baseband filters.
This allows direct connection to most commercial baseband processors without external circuitry.
The transmitter on Zarlink's ZL20200 is a highly linear circuit with a quadrature modulator, IF gain control, and a single-ended output.
The single-ended output delivers enough power to directly drive a two-stage power amplifier, eliminating the need for an external balun (balanced/unbalanced) transformer.
The ZL20200 uses a high-performance, fractional-N synthesiser to control the UHF VCO, which improves reception by ensuring RF channels are tuned rapidly and accurately.
Zarlink's ZL20200 also gives designers flexible control over power consumption, with programmable features to adjust receive and transmit currents to accommodate different operating requirements.
Zarlink's ZL20200 transceiver operates in the 850MHz cellular frequency band in TDMA and AMPS modes, and in the 1900MHz PCS band in TDMA mode.
The chip is fully compliant with the TIA/EIA IS-136 specification.
The device is the first in Zarlink's new series of high-performance, integrated cellphone radio chips.
Early in 2003, Zarlink plans to launch a transceiver for handsets used in 2.5G multiband multimode networks that support Internet-type data services.
The ZL20200 is entering volume production.
It is designed in an advanced SiGe BiCMOS process, and offered in a 56-pin MLP measuring 8 x 8mm.
An evaluation board and API software support the chip.
A TDMA/AMPS reference design will be available in January 2003.
In high volumes, the ZL20200 is priced at less than US $5.00.
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