Kyocera develops ultrathin FWMG0-03 mobile WiFi module
We've got all sorts of incredibly tiny chips serving very unique purposes, but Kyocera has developed a 10- x 8-millimeter wireless LAN wafer that should feel right at home in those oh-so-cramped innards of certain diminutive mobiles. The FWMG0-03 module comes in at just 1.25-millimeters thick, and provides full support for 802.11b/g protocols; aside from mounting all of the circuity on a single side of the board, compactness has been aided by the low temperature cofired ceramic (LTCC) used, "resulting in an enhanced bending strength of 400 MPa which is approximately double that of the general LTCC." The chip draws just 0.85 milliwatts while in standby, 550 milliwatts when transmitting data, and 291 (802.11b) / 345 (802.11g) milliwatts when receiving. While we aren't sure which cellphone manufactures are vying for batches of these minuscule modules, we do know that a trio of operating voltages will be available when these start "volume production within 2006," and SDIO / SPI will be the supported interfaces.




















Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Oliver @ Oct 24th 2006 9:40AM
Nice for it time!
strider_mt2k @ Oct 24th 2006 9:59AM
Man, it makes you wish they made a "Heathkit Nano" or something.
helten @ Oct 24th 2006 12:05PM
I don't get it. Must smaller WiFi chips are available. Fx. this one from CSR: http://www.csr.com/products/unifi2port_spec.htm
It has a size of 5.8 x 6.4 x 0.7 = 26 mm^3 opposite to the Kyocera one with a size of 100 mm^3 - the Kyocera one is almost 4 times bigger...maybe there is a typo in the story?
badonkadonk @ Oct 24th 2006 7:05PM
Helten, the CSR part is only the MAC/PHY and doesn't include things like a high-gain PA, filters, matching circuitry, etc that one would expect in a LTCC module like the one from Kyocera. The part itself may be tiny, but the support components needed to put it on a board increase the total BOM footprint to a larger area than an LTCC (or other modules) will give you.