A 5.9-to-7.8 GHz VCO in 65-nm CMOS using high-Q inductors in an embedded wafer level BGA package

Summary form only given, as follows. We present a 5.9-to-7.8 GHz VCO in a 65 nm CMOS technology assembled in a chip-scale eWLB package. The VCO uses a high-quality LC-tank inductor, realized in the fan-out area of the package. Using this high-Q inductor the phase noise is reduced by as much as 9 dB at 1 MHz offset compared to a reference VCO, having on-chip inductor instead. The VCO using the eWLB inductor offers a phase noise of −118.3 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz and output power of −1.1 dBm. The VCO core consumes 20.2 mA from a 1.2 V supply.