A 28 Gb/s 3-V optical driver with high efficiency in a complementary SiGe:C BiCMOS technology

In this work, a modulator driver in a 0.25 µm SiGe:C complementary BiCMOS technology with f
T
/f
max
of 110 / 180 GHz for the npn and 95 / 140 GHz for the pnp transistor is presented. The driver is implemented following an H-bridge topology, taking advantage of the availability of the pnp HBTs, and delivers a differential output amplitude of 3 Vpp to a 50 Ω load. Clear eye diagrams up to 28 Gb/s are demonstrated. Power dissipation of the full IC is only 175 mW. To the best knowledge of the authors, the reported power efficiency of 6.4% is the highest in comparison to other state-of-the-art drivers.