Overview
Murata Manufacturing Co., Ltd. started in April the mass production of RF sub-modules for Wi-Fi*1.
This product uses Murata semiconductor design technology, monolithic ceramic technology, and circuit design technology to reduce the size of the front end circuit in order to incorporate the Wi-Fi function. This enables reduction of the component surface mount area and decreasing of component contact points in comparison to circuits with the former discrete structure.
Background
Wi-Fi is loaded as a standard function on smartphones these days, and the supporting frequency band increasingly uses the 5GHz band rather than just the former ISM 2.4GHz band. In addition, transmission speeds have improved with recent communications methods by use of spatial multiplexing, and investigation of a 2x2-MIMO*2 structure with high-end smartphones has begun. Accompanying these trends there is a concern about an increase in front end circuit complexity, additional contact points, and greater surface mount area, in comparison to former structures. Murata has implemented its original monolithic ceramic technology and semiconductor design technology to create an RF submodule that incorporates the structural components required by the front end circuit.
This greatly reduces the component mounting area and decreases the component contact points in comparison to circuits with the former discrete structure, saves area for customer design, and contributes to design resources and shortens development cycles.
Features
Applications
Mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet PCs.
Part number
LMFE3NFB-J58
LMFE3NFB-J38
External size
3.0x3.0x0.9max mm
Explanation of terms
*1. Wi-Fi: The standard name for wireless LAN, Wi-Fi enables connection of smartphones, portable devices, televisions, computers and game consoles to a LAN (Local Area Network).
*2. MIMO stands for Multiple-Input and Multiple-Output, a technology that improves communications speed by using multiple transceiving antennas. LTE is starting to be used in wireless LAN.
*3. IEEE802.11a/b/g/n/ac: The IEEE (US Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) communications standard for Wi-Fi.