Low Cost Organic Packaging For Silicon Based mm-wave Wireless Systems

Liquid crystal polymer is utilized as a unique packaging material for millimeter-wave applications. It is used as a multi-chip module platform for a 36 GHz voltage controlled oscillator. The VCO is embedded in a laser-micromachined cavity on LCP and wire bonded to corresponding transmission lines. Measurements are made before and after packaging for comparison of oscillation performance. A figure of merit based on phase noise is used to assess the overall performance before and after packaging. The figure of merit before packaging was calculated to be -173.7 dBc/Hz. After packaging, there was a 13.4 dB degradation in the figure of merit. Specifically this is caused by mismatch introduced by the bond wires that increases phase nod current consumption. Also, the inductive parasitics of the bond wires was found to decrease the tuning range of the oscillator by an order of magnitude.