A 28 GHz four-channel phased-array transceiver in 65-nm CMOS technology for 5G applications

Abstract A 28 GHz fully integrated 4-channel TX/RX 5G beam-forming transceiver is implemented in 65-nm CMOS technology. Each TX/RX channel can be digitally controlled with 5.625 ° phase step and 2 dB gain step. The transceiver employs a heterodyne architecture with 6 GHz intermediate frequency (IF). The transceiver works in a band of frequencies between 26 GHz and 30 GHz. The up/down-conversion mixers are integrated on the same chip with a shared LO chain. The phased-array power combining/splitting is done using a Wilkinson power combiner/divider. Each channel features 3.4–3.9 dB NF and −5 to −3.5 dBm IIP3 in RX mode, high OP1dB of 14.7 dBm and 18 dB gain in TX mode. The maximum rms amplitude and phase error for each channel is 0.25 dB and 1.5 ° across gain and phase states, respectively. The RFIC area is 5.29 × 3.4 mm2 including pads and it consumes 240 mW per channel in TX mode, 120 mW per channel in RX mode and 174 mW for the LO chain with a total power of 1.58 W from a 1.2 V supply.