Vitesse's InP HBT process wins innovation award
California-based Vitesse has won the Frost and Sullivan 2005 Technology Innovation of the Year Award for its InP HBT technology.
The company's technology can be used for the direct digital synthesis of high-frequency radio signals, which helps simplify communication system design and reduce the number of discrete parts.
Vitesse has been developing its VIP-2 technology in conjunction with BAE Systems and the University of Illinois under a $6 million contract from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) (see related story).
According to Frost and Sullivan research analyst Michael Valenti, DARPA hopes to use Vitesse's VIP-2 technology to reduce the size and weight of communication systems in situations where space and payload are critical, such as in combat aircraft.
The VIP-2 process, which is carried out on 4-inch semi-insulating InP substrates, has produced transistors with an fT of 300 GHz that can also feature in a static frequency divider circuit operating at 150 GHz (see related story).
The company's technology, which avoids any costly regrowth processes, has also been used by Eblana Photonics to make distributed feedback lasers operating at 1.54 µm (see related story).