Skyworks Introduces Helios II-Plus EDGE Radio

Woburn, MA -- Skyworks Solutions, Inc. unveiled its Helios II-Plus EDGE radio, suitable for manufacturers developing next-generation quad band handsets incorporating advanced multimedia features such as DVB-H, FM radios, MP3 players, digital cameras, and Web browsing. Helios II-Plus reduces radio frequency board space by an additional 25 percent when compared to the company's previous Helios design. Skyworks' radio solution also interfaces with virtually any analog baseband and simplifies factory calibration, allowing OEMs to increase production throughput. In addition, Helios II-Plus surpasses GSM and EDGE specifications under a variety of conditions such as extreme temperature, low-battery voltage and antenna mismatch. Helios II-Plus also enables increased user talk times by exceeding transmitted radiated power (TRP) specifications for improved current consumption.

"Helios II-Plus demonstrates Skyworks' unique ability to push the RF integration envelope," said Brian M. Daly, vice president of marketing for Skyworks. "Our ultra-compact RF transceiver coupled with our highly efficient front-end module, is enabling entirely new levels of handset performance while at the same time extending consumer talk times. With our broad technological capabilities and support for all tier-one handset OEMs, we are well positioned for further share gains as an increasing number of Helios-based multimedia handsets come to market from Samsung and others."

Helios II-Plus condenses EDGE RF functionality into two compact devices:

SKY74138 RF Transceiver

The SKY74138 RF transceiver is a highly integrated device for multi-band GSM, GPRS and EDGE applications. The receive path implements Skyworks' direct conversion architecture, consisting of four integrated low noise amplifiers (LNAs), a quadrature demodulator and selectable baseband filter. Similar to its predecessors, the transmitter path uses Skyworks' proprietary closed Polar Loop EDGE architecture. This enables the highly integrated device to be combined with virtually any standard GSM/EGPRS baseband without requiring any special processing interfaces.

SKY77523 Tx/Rx FEM

The SKY77523 is a transmit/receive (Tx/Rx) front-end module (FEM) with integrated coupler for quad band GSM and EDGE applications. In addition, a CMOS integrated circuit provides the internal PAC function, interface circuitry, and decoder circuitry to control the RF switches.

Together, feedback signals from the SKY74138 and SKY77523 form an integral part of Skyworks' Polar Loop transmit architecture, which automatically adjusts amplitude and phase, providing robust performances of the radio system, and not relying on blind corrections of the power amplifier process variation like other EDGE transmit architectures.

SOURCE: Skyworks Solutions, Inc.