AWR SOFTWARE IS THE “BACKBONE” IN DESIGNING INDIE, THE WORLD’S FIRST OPERATOR-INDEPENDENT RF HARDWARE PLATFORM
AWR®
SuccessStory
“Collaboration of
antenna design
with RF front-end
module design, on a
common Microwave
Offi ce platform,
enabled breakthrough
success of this
project.”
Juha Ellä (left)Principal Scientist
EPCOS, a TDK group company and
Prasadh Ramachandran (right) Senior Research Engineer
Pulse Finland Oy
PROJECT BACKGROUND
indie is the operator-independent hardware platform that enables global LTE
smartphones. Co-designed and optimized by EPCOS, a TDK group company,
and Pulse Electronics, indie builds on advanced EPCOS multi-feed RF front-end
technology and cutting-edge antenna technology from Pulse Electronics. indie
provides the single RF platform sought by the Next Generation Mobile Network
(NGMN) operator alliance.
THE DESIGN CHALLENGE
The design challenge was to create an operator-independent RF hardware
platform that enables global roaming and downlink inter-band carrier
aggregation for future LTE mobile devices.
THE SOLUTION
The solution relied upon AWR’s software, specifi cally Microwave Offi ce, for the
design of a 3-feed antenna system and RF front-end module architecture. The
software enabled exploration and resulted in the elimination of the need for the
region-specifi c duplexer matching (necessary in single-feed architectures) such
that universal operator-independent applicability resulted. Moreover, the 3-feed
architecture improves the system performance by up to 2 dB, and facilitates
WLAN interoperability given better intermodulation linearity.
Additionally, Pulse used AWR software to create circuit simulations of the
antenna system and the matching circuits, as well as a general documentation
platform. EPCOS used Microwave Offi ce for the circuit simulations of the
front-end module including couplers, switches, duplexers, fi lters and diplexers,
as well as for the modeling of the nonlinear passive duplexer.
The RF front-end module from EPCOS. The 3-feed antenna system from Pulse.
Application:RF Hardware Platform
AWR Software:Microwave Offi ce™
AWR®
SuccessStory
AWR, 1960 East Grand Avenue, Suite 430, El Segundo, CA 90245, USATel: +1 (310) 726-3000 Fax: +1 (310) 726-3005 www.awrcorp.com
© Copyright 2012 AWR Corporation. All rights reserved. AWR is a National Instruments Company.AWR and the AWR logo are registered trademarks and Microwave Offi ce is a trademark of AWR Corporation. Other product and company names listed are trademarks or trade names of their respective companies.
SS-EPTD-2012.5.12
THE SOLUTION CONTINUES
Key features in Microwave Offi ce that enabled this success:
• Easy to use tool.
• Microwave Offi ce is more intuitive to use than other tools on
the market and the documentation is likewise well received.
• Enables the easy set-up of a single schematic for the testing
of a large number of carrier aggregation pairs within the
antenna and front-end module simulation.
• The AWR technical support is fast and friendly.
• The accuracy of AWR circuit simulation.
• The front-end module performance compared very well to
measurements.
• AWR’s online user-defi ned nonlinear models are fl exible
and easy to implement.
• Quality of library components: models match well with
real life measurements.
AWR Microwave Offi ce makes it possible to accurately predict
the performance of the antenna system together with the RF
front-end module. Without detailed circuit simulation it would not
have been possible to design and optimize the performance of the
new RF hardware platform and to show that the indie platform has
signifi cant benefi ts over traditional approaches. Using Microwave
Offi ce as a “backbone” for the circuit simulation of both the antenna
and the RF front-end module resulted in breakthrough success with
the fi rst universal RF hardware on the market.
Comparison of two antenna/front-end solutions when carrier aggregation band pair 3&7 are selected.
Pulse Mobile Division is a global leader in antennas for
mobile phones, smart phones, tablets and laptops. Pulse
has delivered over 1.5 billion mobile antennas to the leading
manufacturers of mobile devices. Pulse Mobile Division is
headquartered in Kempele, Finland, and has service offi ces in
China, South Korea, Taiwan and the USA.
www.pulseelectronics.com
EPCOS is a group company of TDK Corporation, which markets the product
brands TDK and EPCOS. In addition to its broad portfolio of passive
components, the company is a global market leader in high-frequency
components such as surface acoustic wave (SAW) fi lter products and
modules. These products are used by leading manufacturers of mobile
phones and telecommunications equipment, as well as in a wide range of
automotive safety and telematics applications.
www.epcos.com
indie was nominated for a 2012 Global Mobile
Award — “Best Technology Breakthrough” category
View related video on YouTube: http://youtu.be/ENFO5llSczY