Last year Axiom Microdevices, Inc. has shipped more than 10 million units of its quad-band GPRS CMOS power amplifier (PA) to handset manufacturers. The CMOS PA is manufactured by TSMC.

"Axiom is very pleased to report growth by a factor of 10 since we announced the shipment of our first million units in the second quarter of 2007," said Brett Butler, chief executive officer, Axiom Microdevices. "More customers are starting to enjoy the benefits of a simpler CMOS supply chain after years of being locked into proprietary process technologies with complex supply chains."

During 2007, the industry experienced a shortage of power amplifiers impacting shipments of cellular handsets in China. "This tends to happen regularly due to the small-scale manufacturing capabilities of the leading PA suppliers relative to silicon CMOS industry and TSMC, Axiom's manufacturing partner. By leveraging mainstream CMOS-based process technologies, we have been able to insulate our customers from supply shortages through a very steep production ramp," continued Butler.

"In short, Axiom puts the power amplifier on a silicon CMOS cost curve through the use of economies of scale and supply chain simplicity that TSMC's 0.13um RF-CMOS provides," said Ken Chen, director mainstream technology marketing at TSMC.

Axiom Microdevices' quad-band GPRS CMOS PA, designated the AX502, is based on Axiom's patented technology which allows the use of 0.13-micrometer silicon CMOS process technology to integrate all of the functions between transmitter output and transmit/receive switch. The CMOS PA realizes power gain stages, small signal control circuitry and 50-Ohm matching on a single die, achieving what was previously only viable with devices manufactured in proprietary gallium arsenide (GaAs) process technology and assembled in complex multichip module packaging, according to the supplier.

www.axiom-micro.com

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