DUBLIN – February 25th, 2014 – S3 Group , a global supplier of Mixed-Signal IP and silicon solutions to semiconductor vendors, OEMs and service operators, today launched the industry’s smallest, most-efficient high speed SAR-ADC (successive approximation register analog-to-digital converter). The product is the first in a family of SAR ADCs being developed by the company specifically optimized for consumer SoCs.
This is a high-speed 160MS/s 12bit ADC targeting highly integrated SoCs, such as those requiring LTE and 802.11ac connectivity. Implemented in 40nm SMIC, this converter delivers excellent dynamic linearity performance for all cellular and WiFi connected devices, while consuming as little as 6mW and occupying only 0.09mm2 of silicon. This same ADC core in 28nm will consume less than 3mW, while using less than 0.06mm2 of silicon.
“As an industry we have a healthy obsession with high efficiency and small die area and we at S3 Group embrace this obsession by continuously innovating to address the incessant need for faster access to mobile content. Regardless of the application, data converters must deliver higher bandwidth at higher speed with lower power and attractive cost of ownership. This exciting launch today marks the first in a series of dynamic ADCs available from S3 Group which set a new standard of performance per milliWatt enabling our customers to bring superior differentiating consumer products to market faster. ” said Dermot Barry, VP Silicon BU, S3 Group.
