TI Intros New Envelope Tracking Power Supply Solutions

If there is one common complaint from smartphone users around the world, it is the lack of battery power, which tends to go at the most inconvenient times. As consumers integrate their devices with bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policies in the workplace and use them more than ever, the grumbles about battery life will undoubtedly get much louder. Texas Instruments (TI), a global semiconductor design and manufacturing company that develops analog ICs and embedded processors,  has announced the introduction of the most efficient and robust RF envelope tracking power supply supporting all 3G and LTE bands, including full 20-MHz LTE spectrum.

By using WCDMA and Long-Term Evolution (LTE) modulation methods with quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) over orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM), higher speed technologies such as 3G and 4G are less efficient. Envelope tracking replaces the fix DC supply voltage to the RF PA (power amplifier) with the dynamic supply voltage tracking the amplitude or envelope of the transmitted RF signal. This allows improved energy efficiency of radiofrequency power amplifiers.

The new LM3290 and LM3291 are able to reduce the power amplifier temperature by 20°C (68°F) and then reduce the overall power consumption by 25 percent over systems that use average power tracking.

Key features and benefits of LM3290 and LM3291 are:

• Bandwidth and battery voltage flexibility that supports the requirement of the power amplifiers of major suppliers.
• High efficiency attainability of more than 90 percent with the advanced power tracking for LTE 25RB.
• Increased power capacity with maximum transmit power even if the battery voltage is low.
• Seamless analog and digital interface support with a seamless transition between envelope tracking and average power tracking operating modes.
• High performance with low noise for both units provides high efficiency, low noise, low output impedance and low output ripple voltage at high LTE bandwidths (LTE10 and 20).

According to the company samples, evaluation modules, and complete sheet will be available to select customers.