Cellular System Solutions For GSM / GPRS Wireless Terminals

Skyworks Solutions has expanded its family of GSM/GPRS cellular system solutions to increase customer options for reducing the cost and time-to-market for building quad-band handsets with improved performance and advanced multimedia features.

Building on Skyworks' earlier five-chip antenna-to-microphone system, the company has introduced two new platforms that address the size and integration needs of handset customers worldwide. For customers that desire a smaller, more compact footprint, Skyworks offers a three-chip system that incorporates a baseband processor, a mixed-signal device and the company's recently introduced Single Package Radio™ solution. Skyworks has also introduced a four-chip system with the same functionality, to support customers seeking a lower-cost approach.

"We have further extended the industry's broadest portfolio of system platforms across a wide range of applications, from those where cost, size and power efficiency are at a premium, to applications where design simplicity and time-to-market are of paramount concern," said Murthy Renduchintala, Skyworks' vice president of Cellular Systems. "Based on our portfolio of field-proven components with optimized interfaces, our system solutions enable both established OEMs and the rapidly emerging set of ODMs and contract manufacturers to move from a zero start to handset production in just six months."

Skyworks pioneered the concept of complete handset system solutions in 1996, and today offers the industry's most comprehensive system solution for GPRS handsets. Like the company's previous platforms, Skyworks' new system solutions provide all of the required hardware and software necessary to build a complete wireless terminal.

The software includes a complete, operator-qualified, network-approved GSM/GPRS protocol stack plus all reference user interface software necessary to deliver a Internet- and multimedia-enabled handset. The reference user interface is architected so that handset manufacturers can easily customize and differentiate their products by editing a Java script-based language. This reduces engineering resources required to develop and test the user interface (UI), and dramatically shortens the development cycle while allowing manufacturers to create distinctive, appealing user experiences. Multimedia features include integrated web-browsing software, gaming, multimedia messaging (MMS), MP3 and JPEG decoders, and an embedded polyphonic tone generator.

Skyworks provides comprehensive design services for its system solutions via a worldwide customer support organization with locations in all key GSM markets. From these design centers, Skyworks enables customers to accelerate handset development from initial board layout, integration and test through GCF approvals and ultimately factory testing. This support is further enhanced through the availability of a hardware/software reference design.

Technical Details

Skyworks' three- and four-chip system platforms help to position GSM/GPRS handset technology as one of the most effective ways to deliver the advanced Internet services of next-generation, packet-based wireless terminals. They include all the necessary devices for building a state-of-the-art quad-band (850/900/1800/1900) GSM/GPRS handset, including digital and analog baseband processor, power management and radio frequency (RF) transceiver, and multi-band/multi-slot power amplifier circuitry. The highly integrated, three-chip solution includes:

CX815 Baseband Processor
A dual-core processor consisting of a DSP and ARM7 THUMB™ Reduced Instruction Set Computing (RISC) processor core that is optimized for low-power GSM/GPRS cellular handset applications. The baseband incorporates 1 Mbit of integrated SRAM along with enhanced functionality including GPRS Class 12, an AMR vocoder, MP3 and JPEG decoding, Java support, SPI, and I2S interfaces to support MMC and separate application processors. Available in a 10 mm x 10 mm CABGA, 180-pin package.

CX20524 Mixed Signal Device
A highly integrated device that implements all the power management, voice-band, mixed-signal and radio-control functions, and supports multi-slot GPRS up to Class 12. Available in a 10 mm x 10 mm CABGA, 180-pin package.
SKY74073 Single Package Radio Solution

Combines all of the radio circuitry required for GSM/GPRS handsets into a single dime-sized package that is one-third the size of alternative approaches. The device incorporates the company's Full Type-approved (FTA) single-chip direct conversion transceiver and a proven Skyworks power amplifier (PA) module that incorporates an EGSM900 PA block, a DCS1800/PCS1900 PA block, two surface acoustic wave (SAW) filters, a switchplexer module and impedance-matching circuitry for 50 ohm input and output, and bias-control circuitry. Available in a 13 mm x 13 mm MCM, 40-pin package.

GSM/GPRS Protocol Stack
Consists of a complete GSM Phase 2+ and multi-slot GPRS-compliant protocol stack. This software is developed, maintained and supported by a global Skyworks software team and implements the most advanced features including PBCCH, coding schemes 1 - 4. Already in production, the complete protocol stack has been tested extensively worldwide on all types of infrastructure and has successfully completed GCF testing.
Mobile Applications and User Interface (MAUI™) software<br> A UI reference design for accelerating handset delivery. It is architected to separate functional implementation (i.e., mobile originated phone call, sending an SMS message, etc.) from functional presentation to the user. This enables customers to easily modify the UI "look and feel" to create distinctive, appealing products. Third-party applications such as WAP browser, MMS client, Java and predictive text input are integrated to further accelerate customer development.