While sometimes taken for granted, antenna design is becoming increasingly
important in the successful design of mobile devices and handsets. This
has become even more profound in recent years with the growing number of
technologies packed into smaller form-factors, each with different frequencies
and some utilizing multiple-input, multiple-output (MIMO) technologies.
The antenna is important since it is the only structure in a mobile device that
communicates directly with the network. How these structures are designed
and where they are placed inside a device can have a big impact on how the
device performs.
But designing MIMO into smaller devices comes with its own unique challenges.
With multiple antennas, more space is typically needed to ensure that the
multiple antennas operate without interfering with each other. This
problem can become even more challenging when working with technologies that
operate in close proximity – such as WiMAX at 2.5GHz and Wi-Fi at 2.4GHz.
SkyCross has solved this problem with its iMATTM technology (short
for isolated mode antenna technology) which enables a single antenna to function
like multiple antennas, without compromising the performance of each antenna or
the industrial design of the device. This is accomplished by utilizing a
single radiating structure with multiple feed points.
The company, founded in 2000, provides a complete host of antenna solutions for
the mobile phone, home entertainment and computing industries. The company
considers itself more of a solutions company that can apply a wide variety of
technologies depending on the needs of its customers.
"Many of our solutions are specific to each customer device," says Joe
Gifford, Vice President at SkyCross. "The product we develop is customer
specific with SkyCross technology and techniques used in an ‘artistically’
developed way to solve each customer’s problem."
The company is active in a number of technologies, including 802.11n and the
next generation of IEEE standards. This year
alone the company will ship 120 million antennas in a variety of different
market segments.
In the WiMAX space, the company works with all the major players and even
includes Intel as one of its investors (the only antenna company that Intel has
an investment in). Last year, SkyCross technology was included in Airspan’s
MiMAX Quad-Band USB dongle – the first WiMAX Forum certified USB device and
winner of several industry awards. The device was certified to operate in
the 2.5GHz band, but is also designed to operate in every frequency from 2.3GHz
to 5.9 GHz.
SkyCross technology was included in one of the first WiMAX CPEs on Sprint’s Xohm
network in Baltimore and was selected by WiMAX operator VMAX in Taiwan for use
in their USB dongle. SkyCross was also recently selected as the antenna
provider for several devices on the UQ Communications network in Japan and the
Clearwire network in the United States.
"We have developed the technology that sits on the reference design of WiMAX
chip companies such as Samsung, Beceem , Sequans, GCT and others," says Gifford.
"Some of those reference designs are then included in products produced by
Novatel, Sierra Wireless and Huawei."
The company also considers the RF approach that it takes in designing the
electrical-mechanical radiating device as part of its key advantage. "When
people think of an antenna, they typically think of a radiating metal device
that you put in a device," says Gifford. "With our approach, we develop
some type of electrical-mechanical radiating property, it could be anything as
inexpensive as possible, and we use that to excite the entire device that it is
going into. For example, with a USB dongle, we can get the entire device
to radiate."
From a cost/performance perspective, the company claims that its iMAT technology
can cut the cost in half and boost performance and efficiencies 2X when compared
to traditional technologies. With today’s smaller devices, operating at
higher frequencies and non-line of site environments, these performance gains
can be significant – improving the subscribers experience while on the network
and reducing overall network costs.
Operators such as Clearwire have taken notice and are influencing the design of
handsets by insisting that suppliers consider using SkyCross. "We have
been working with Clearwire, and they liked what they saw in the performance
metrics," says Gifford. "We do a great job, especially in small form
factors and can improve the antenna performance significantly compared to other
traditional solutions."
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