Startup introduces RF power management IC

Quantance (San Mateo, CA) calls its technology, which is based on several patented innovations, qBoost. As well as boosting efficiency Quantance claimed the technology also increases the PA tolerance to antenna mismatch and extends the PA’s operating frequency range.

The Q1005 supports four frequency bands in different combinations of high band and low band operation and can address most configurations – from single-band systems to quad-band systems – used by carriers around the world, Quantance said. It is designed to integrate with RF front-end transmit circuits and requires minimal connections, no special software or firmware, and no calibration, leaving the original RF transmit circuit architecture virtually unchanged.

The chip comes in a quad flatpack no lead (QFN) package and Serial Port Interface (SPI) and Universal Asynchronous Receive Transmit (UART) interfaces offer flexibility for baseband software integration. Quantance also supplies configuration and performance tuning software. Samples of the Q1005 will be available in March 2011.

"With our chip, mobile devices can achieve blazing fast data uploads and enhanced high-speed data coverage that will impress consumers. At the same time, qBoost helps eliminate the nagging issues that seem to plague most of today’s popular devices like poor battery life, overheating and antenna problems." said Vikas Vinayak, Quantance’s CEO, in a statement.

"qBoost is not a polar modulation scheme, nor a power tracking scheme that uses look-up tables and requires burdensome calibration," said Serge Drogi, Quantance’s CTO, in the same statement. "Instead, qBoost is a self-contained, self-aligned, efficient PA management system utilizing ultra-fast power conversion and RF closed loop feedback that is designed specifically for mobile devices, and outperforms these other PA power management schemes."