More than ten years ago LDMOS transistors were introduced as a replacement of bipolar transistors for RF power applications [1,2].
Nowadays LDMOS technology is the leading RF power technology for base station applications, in particular for GSM-EDGE applications at 1 and 2 GHz, WCDMA applications at 2.2 GHz and more recently for WiMax applications around 2.7 GHz and 3.8 GHz.
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One of the last niche application areas in which bipolar devices were used was the 3-4 GHz microwave area, such as S-band radar. Main reason for this was that earlier generations of LDMOS showed a similar performance at 3 GHz compared to bipolar, which did not justify redesign of complex radar systems.
The main driver for LDMOS is a high volume application, which enables continuous improvement of the LDMOS technology [3,4], and this has resulted in the latest generation LDMOS, which outperforms bipolar at S-band frequencies with some additional advantages such as ruggedness and better thermal behaviour. In this article an overview is given of the LDMOS improvements at 3-4 GHz and the LDMOS performance for microwave products is presented.
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