Jeng-Shien Hsieh

Array antenna integrated fan-out wafer level packaging (InFO-WLP) for millimeter wave system applications

Array antenna integrated with RF chip using InFO-WLP technology is proposed for millimeter wave system applications. Aperture-coupled patch antenna is designed on the fan-out molding compound (MC). The performance of single-element antenna is evaluated first and proved to have 5 dBi of gain. Meanwhile, the interconnect from chip to antenna feeding line is demonstrated to only have 0.7 dB loss, which can save 19 % PA output power compared with that of flip-chip package. Finally, the system performance of 4 × 4 antenna array integrated with RF chip on the InFO structure shows 14.7 dBi of array gain in a small form factor of 10 × 10 × 0.5 mm3.

High performance passive devices for millimeter wave system integration on integrated fan-out (InFO) wafer level packaging technology

High performance passive devices for millimeter wave (MMW) system, including inductor, ring resonator, power combiner, coupler, balun, transmission line, and antenna, are first realized using integrated fan-out (InFO) wafer level packaging technology. The inductors has quality factor over 40; the power combiner, coupler, and balun show lower transmission loss than on-chip passives; antenna has the efficiency of over 60%. These devices on InFO enable low noise and power MMW system for mobile communication and IoT applications.

Power saving and noise reduction of 28nm CMOS RF system integration using integrated fan-out wafer level packaging (InFO-WLP) technology

An integration of 28 nm CMOS RF system with 3D solenoidal inductors (3DSI) in integrated fan-out (InFO) wafer level package technology is studied. The 3DSI provides the performance of Q-factor of 51 and isolation of -53 dB. With the 3DSI, the RF system in the InFO technology results in power saving by 58% and noise reduction by 80% in LNA and VCO, respectively, compared with those in RF SoC system. The InFO technology provides a novel solution for RF system integration.

High Performance Chip-Partitioned Millimeter Wave Passive Devices on Smooth and Fine Pitch InFO RDL

High performance millimeter wave passive devices are realized on smooth, fine pitch InFO redistribution layer (RDL). These passive devices are balun, power combiner, coupler, and microstrip line and the electrical performances are measured from 0.1GHz to 67 GHz through VNA. The measurement results show that the transmission loss of on-InFO balun (4.3 dB), the power divider (4.3 dB), and the coupler (4.9 dB) outperforms on-chip one by 2.1 dB, 1 dB, and 0.2 dB, respectively. While the transmission loss of microstrip line (0.34 dB/mm) is better than on-chip one by 0.17 dB/mm at 60 GHz. Furthermore, the parasitic of InFO chip-package interconnection has been investigated and compared to other technologies with and without solder bumps. The parasitic resistance, inductance, and capacitance for InFO interconnection are 75 %, 76 %, and 14 % lower than those for chip-last, face-down technology. Parasitic resistance for InFO RDL is 10 % lower than that for chip-first face-down technology with uneven RDL.

Ultra-low-resistance 3D InFO inductors for integrated voltage regulator applications

A novel 3D InFO inductor is developed to integrate with TSMC 16nm FinFET devices for high efficiency integrated voltage regulator (IVR) design. The 3D InFO inductor is designed using thick through-InFO-via (TIV) copper, where the form factor is 1.4 × 2.2 × 0.15 mm3. It performs 2.14 nH inductance at 140 MHz and 3.2 mΩ resistance at DC. The resistance of power delivery network (PDN) between inductor and load is 1.1 mu. The InFO technology provides the low resistance 3D inductor and PDN concurrently for the IVR system design to achieve a peak power efficiency of 93%.