4 ms·
Says low-cost but anyone knows what exactly is "low cost" here?
by asadkn 7y ago
Says low-cost but anyone knows what exactly is "low cost" here?
- rkangel 7y agoWith the process technologies they're using, I'd guess 10s to 100s dollars.
- jandrese 7y agoFor a phased array antenna?
- rkangel 7y agoFor the antenna yes. Doesn't included the associated electronics to drive it.
- madengr 7y agoI'm betting the front-end chip is all CMOS, as opposed to SiGe, so it will be quite cheap (under $10 in volume). 16 TX elements at a total of 20 dBm transmit power is 8 dBm/element, which is feasible in CMOS. State of the art in CMOS is 9 dBm at 80 GHz. The antenna will be cheap too as there are number of spread spread glass laminates out now; I have used Rogers RO1200 for mmWave work. The only thing that may make it expensive is the air-gap construction, which they have probably done to increase the bandwidth. I would assume two laminates are needed.
- Robotbeat 7y agoSure, why not? It depends on the number of elements, of course, but at these frequencies, you can fabricate a LOT of elements for low cost because they're small. Perhaps even chip-scale integration is possible. $1/element is feasible for phased arrays.
- mNovak 7y agoThe antennas are practically free; the cost comes from phase shifters, amplifiers, etc, which don't see much miniaturization benefit at high frequencies. One day $1 per element is feasible, but definitely not today.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]