Introduction

Early in 1994, M/A-COM began offering a family of plastic packaged GaAs MMIC low noise amplifiers (LNAs) featuring single positive supply voltage, low noise figure, high dynamic range, and low power consumption for the high volume commercial wireless communications market. These MMIC LNAs use M/A-COM’s 0.5-micron, low noise GaAs MESFET process and are housed in low cost, 8-lead SOIC packages. These LNAs are tested in M/A-COM’s volume automated facility to achieve low production cost. The LNAs share a common ‘platform,’ a product concept explained in the first major section below, enabling fast development and delivery cycles.