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Competition in the RF Power Amplifier (PA) space is definitely heating up. Last month, Black Sand Technologies announced the world’s first 3G CMOS based RF PA. Earlier this month, VT Silicon, announced the world’s first silicon-based 4G PA. Based out of Atlanta, GA, VT Silicon is fabless semiconductor startup which was incorporated in 2002 and initially focused primarily on military applications. In 2007, the company kicked off efforts to commercialize some of the developed technology, specifically targeting WiMax applications. At about the same time VT Silicon raised $3.3 million in Series A funding from Menlo Ventures. VT Silicon’s first chip will be the VMF2500 WiMax/WiFi Front End RFIC, for which the block diagram is shown below.

Instead of gallium arsenide (GaAs), which is traditionally used for power amplifiers, VT Silicon intends to use Silicon Germanium (SiGe) BICMOS which has a significant cost advantage over GaAs, and as such should be of interest to mobile device manufacturers. The company has developed what it refers to as Linearity Enhancement Technology (LET), which improves the linear operating range of their amplifiers, resulting in less signal distortion and yielding a more power efficient system. It is this LET technology that enables the company to use SiGe instead of GaAs while still delivering competitive performance. Further, SiGe enables VT Silicon to integrate a complex CMOS control circuit directly onto the IC, which the company refers to as Intelligent RF. This circuitry can then be utilized to continually tweak the configuration of the PA to optimize performance for lowest power consumption based on factors such as battery voltage, temperature, or the TX power level. The CMOS circuitry also enables the IC to be software configurable. All in all, the VMF2500 becomes a single chip RF PA solution, as opposed to multi-chip solutions that are comment these days on the front end. The company expects the quiescent current for chip to be less than 45mA when in low-power TX mode. Samples for strategic partners are expected to become available in the 2nd quarter of 2010, with mass production targeted the follow in the 4th quarter.

One list we definitely have come to appreciate over the years is the EETimes Emerging Startups List. Every few months the list gets updated, and it just so happens that a few days ago it was updated to version 9.0. On occasion these updates are lackluster featuring few new emerging startups, however, just like last time around, this new list contains plenty of new additions. This time around new companies accounted for almost 30 percent of the list. Once again, California did rather well claiming 30 percent of the newly added companies; however, Europe also claimed a surprising 35 percent of the list. Several of the newly added companies will be familiar to regular ChipCrunch readers, but just in case a refresher is needed, we provided links to our previous coverage of these companies where applicable. The new additions are summarized below:

• AutoESL Design Technologies Inc. (Cupertino, CA) – Is developing next generation High-Level Synthesis (HSL) technology. Current product is titled AutoPilot, and can synthesize designs written in C, C++, and SystemC.

• BlackSand Technologies Inc. (Austin, TX) – has developed the world’s first CMOS based 3F RF power amplifier. ChipCrunch coverage: 1, 2, 3
  

• Blue Wonder Communications GmbH (Dresden, Germany) – independent design house and a licensor of Long Term Evolution (LTE) Intellectual Property (IP), which is a next generation mobile standard.

• Direct2Silicon Inc. (San Jose, CA) – provides software and IP that enables direct write e-beam lithography for System-on-Chip integrated circuits (SoCs). Direct write e-beam technology requires neither optical lithography nor masks, thus ought to be cheaper for small production runs according to the company.

• Energy Micro A/S (Oslo, Norway) – is developing energy efficient microcontrollers based on modern microprocessor architectures. Current products are based on the ARM Cortex-M3 processor.

• Everspin Technologies Inc. (Chandler, Ariz.) – spinoff from Freescale Semiconductor that specializes in Magnetoresistive Random Access Memory (MRAM) and integrated magnetic sensors.

• Liquavista BV (Eindhoven, Netherlands) – is developing electronic screen technology based on the principles of Electrowetting. Electrowetting enables color displays that utilize significantly less battery power, and are currently targeted at electronic readers.

• Netronome Systems Inc. (Pittsburgh, PA) – specializes in intelligent network flow processing using highly programmable network flow processors and acceleration cards targeted at enterprise-class communications products.

• OneChip Photonics Inc. (Ottawa, Canada) – is developing and manufacturing low-cost, high-performance optical transceivers based on monolithic Photonic Integrated Circuits (PICs) in Indium Phosphide (InP) , with which the company is hoping to enable ubiquitous deployment of Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH).

• Open Kernel Labs (Chicago, IL) – specializes in mobile phone virtualization solutions. To date, the OKL4 Microvisor has shipped in over 300 million phones worldwide.

• Ozmo Devices Inc. (Palo Alto, CA) – is developing Wi-Fi compatible communication technologies target at battery-operated devices, with the intent of delivering cost-effective wireless personal area networks (WPAN) connectivity.

• PolyIC GmbH & Co. KG (Fuerth, Germany) – is developing polymer electronic technology, in other words electrical conducting and semi conducting plastics, which the company hopes will usher in the age of ubiquitous printed electronics.

• Powervation Ltd. (Limerick, Ireland) – specializes in digital power control circuits, an earlier this year introduced the company’s inaugural PV3002 power conversion chip. ChipCrunch coverage: 1, 2

• Samplify Systems Inc. (Santa Clara, CA) – is developing mixed-signal ICs, that combine high performance analog circuits with advanced digital processing to create a new class of intelligent data converters for DSP systems, targeting the medical imagining, wireless, defense, and communications markets.

• Semprius Inc. (Durham, NC) – is developing technology that enables the printing of high-performance semiconductors on a wider range of substrates. The company’s primary focus currently is high performance concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) modules for solar power generation. ChipCrunch coverage: 1
  
• Tabula Inc. (Santa Clara, CA) – is working on software and hardware solutions that the company claims will replace current FPGA solutions and will speed up the adoption of programmable logic devices for what are traditionally ASIC based solutions.
• Tiempo SA (Grenoble, France) – is developing IPs and EDA tools that enable the design of clock-less integrated circuits. The company’s current IP includes asynchronous microcontroller cores, microprocessors, as well as communication and sensor interfaces. 
  
  

Anyone who ever had to hook up a serious amount of electronic equipment knows that wiring everything together in a neat fashion is a major hassle and quite a time consuming task. Once hooked up, we are more likely to move everything else in a room to make the arrangement work, rather than dealing with the wiring again. Granted, over the last decade the number of wires needed for particular applications has been decreasing due to the utilization of wireless standards such as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi and due to new interface such as HDMI. However, the pesky power cable that most appliances require, be it only for charging at times, has proven hard to get rid off. But there seems to be some hope on the horizon coming from a startup aptly named WiTricty. Founded in 2007 and based out of Watertown, MA, WiTricity was formed to commercialize technology for wireless electricity transfer that was developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) about two years prior. The actual technology behind this wireless feat is called resonant magnetic coupling, which enables devices to transfer energy through a magnetic filed over mid-range distances. The company demonstrated wirelessly powering a 60W light bulb in 2007 at a distance of 2 meters with a 40 percent efficiency. The picture below depicts WiTricity’s vision about how that company envisions the technology being implemented.

Although WiTricity claims that the magnetic fields generated will be harmless to humans, since magnetic fields interact weakly with biological organisms, I expect that many people will be rather uneasy about this technology initially. People still have many questions regarding the safety of cell phones and one would expect the same with this technology. A detailed discussion of several methods for wirelessly transferring energy can be found here. It should be noted that the fundamentals behind WiTricity’s technology are not really new. Back in the 19th century Nikola Tesla demonstrated the wireless illumination of phosphorescent lamps using a similar technique. This just shows you that what may seem new, might simply be a new implementation of an old idea. Nevertheless, if WiTricity can deliver a reliable solution at a descent price, and can convince OEMs to integrate it technology into upcoming products, there will clearly be a market for it. Now, what about preventing your next door neighbor from stealing your wireless electricity – is another set of authentication nightmares on the way?

We’ve written about Black Sand Technologies, a semiconductor startup focused on CMOS RF Power Amplifiers out of Austin, TX, on several occasions: We first profiled the company back in 2007, shortly after the company raised $8.2 Million in Series A funding. Last year, we briefly discussed Black Sand’s chief technologist Susanne Paul and her thoughts regarding silicon based power amplifiers. As yet another year rolls around; it is good to see that Black Sand Technologies has continued working hard on their products and has seemingly made some very good progress.

Earlier this week, the company announced that it has produced the world’s first 3G CMOS based RF Power Amplifier (PA). In addition, the company was also able to raise $10 Million in Series B funding from the same venture capital firms as last time, namely Austin Ventures and North Bridge Partners. This brings the total funding for the company to a respectable $18.2 Million. Most of the claims regarding the newly announced product seem to make sense at least on the surface: lower cost vs. Gallium Arsenide (GaAs) based amplifiers, more battery life do to programmability and compact integration, as well as better overall performance. We’ll see about better yields and call quality once products begin shipping with this new technology. Overall, the company seems to be very well positioned at this point. As mobile devices such as smart phones and netbooks gain in popularity, and adopt ever higher data transfer standards such as 3G, 4G, and beyond, it is fair to expect that the number of required PAs per device will increase. Since these devices are part of a highly price sensitive market, in which battery-life is of uttermost importance, it is only a question of when, not if, the IP developed by Black Sand Technologies will get integrated into ICs for the next must have mobile devices.