Application of 3-D EM Simulation in Research of Integrated Inductors, Package Effects and System in Package Design

摘要

As the design focus is moving from System-on-Chip (SoC) to System-in-Package (SiP) technology, 3-D package design and 3-D design flow have become two challenging issues in high-frequency designs. In this paper, both issues have been investigated successfully. At first, the accuracy of 3-D EM simulation results was proven by research on integrated inductors. Then a transceiver package design was examined successfully with 3-D EM simulation. For better evaluation of its coupling effects, a simplified equivalent circuit model was extracted from the simulation results allowing a much faster and more accurate circuit simulation. Furthermore, a new SiP design flow integrated with 3-D EM simulation was applied to implement a Low Noise Amplifier (LNA) IC matched with a high-quality inductor on Low Temperature Cofired Ceramic (LTCC) substrate. Compared to its counterpart matched with a SMD inductor on PCB, it demonstrates higher integration and significant performance improvement.