A 5 To 6.5 Ghz Ltcc Power Amplifier Module

A hybrid power amplifier was manufactured in a 12 layer low-temperature cofired ceramic (LTCC) substrate based on Dupont 951 green tapes. It consists of a silicon push-pull power amplifier integrated circuit in a 40GHz f(T) BiCMOS technology, impedance matching balun, decoupling and bypassing capacitors and transmission lines integrated in the LTCC substrate. The module achieves 24.8 dBm output power at 5.9 GHz, 23 dB gain with 2 dB gain flatness over the full frequency range and 36% power added efficiency (PAE). In this paper we discuss the design of the LTCC impedance matching balun well suited for push-pull power amplifiers, LTCC capacitors and the thermal management of the package.