SBIR Phase II: High Performance Millimeter-Wave Radiofrequency (RF) Front-End Technology for Multi-Gigabit Wireless Communications

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project is a platform enabling a wide range of high-throughput wireless communications for the next generation of broadband multigigabit connectivity. More specifically, the technology seeks to solve some of the key underlying challenges of millimeter-wave (mmWave or high band 5G) radios and networks and a wide set of 5G/6G wireless applications, including fixed and mobile wireless access.

The project is an enabler of many applications including automotive, manufacturing, and healthcare to smart city Internet of Things (IoT) and smart home. Many of the more advanced 5G/6G wireless use cases focus on connecting previously unconnected or under-connected communities and industries. As a building block of 5G/6G wireless technologies, the proposed advanced wireless technology may enable rapid and robust roll-out of the next generation network and play a role in increasing the pace of 5G technology penetration.

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase II project aims to develop a high gain beamforming antenna system, as the core of a millimeter-wave (mmWave) radio frequency (RF) front-end technology for the next generation of multi-gigabit applications. With 10x higher availability of bandwidth compared to the legacy sub-6 GHz spectrum, mmWave enables faster connection speeds and is of significant focus in the telecommunication industry.

These applications have recently motivated Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and other international counterparts to open several frequency bands at mmWave spectrum for communication applications including 5G cellular, wireless infrastructure, etc. Despite these advantages, the existing commercially available mmWave front-end technologies are limited in their performance and are not suitable for the emerging fixed and mobile access use cases of 5G mmWave.

To address this need, this project proposes a novel beamforming mmWave technology that supports an order of magnitude higher aggregated throughput compared to the existing mmWave wireless solutions and can serve as an enabler to a number of data-intensive applications. Integrated as a wireless solution for Fixed Wireless Access (FWA), this technology offers significant cost savings and revenue for network and service operators and providers.

This project builds on the technical achievements of the Phase I effort and focuses on design implementation and prototyping of the high performance mmWave antenna technology. This technology provides a combination of power-efficient beamforming with high-gain multi-gigabit throughputs and is based on a novel architecture along with high-performance antenna systems and sub-systems that are fundamentally different from the existing state-of-the-art mmWave wireless technologies.

To enable realization of this technology, the team is applying a set of unique design methodologies and technologies to tackle the challenges of the proposed complex mmWave front-end technology. The result is an ultra-high gain mmWave beamforming system that closes the fundamental technology gap in the mmWave wireless communication industry.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.