Dr. Bob Brodersen, co-founder of the Berkeley Wireless Research Center and Chairman of the Board at BEEcube, said, “5G is expected to increase cellular network capacity by a thousandfold. To meet these rising demands, utilizing millimeter waves is essential. Existing tools are very limited and unintegrated for developing prototypes in the millimeter wave frequency range. By providing this millimeter wave prototyping solution without any competing solutions in the frequency range, we are able to fill the large gap that companies have faced when trying to develop 5G system prototypes early.”

The integrated BEEcube BEE7 base station platform is connected with two 60GHz broadband transceivers and phased-array antennas, enhancing performance through a higher absolute frequency range and channel bandwidth. In addition, Xilinx’s highly configurable point-to-point (P2P) 500 MHz millimeter wave modem IP includes numerous features, including adaptive modulation and bandwidth, high-performance LDPC FEC, adaptive DPD, I/Q imbalance correction, automatic frequency recovery, and a hybrid decision-oriented equalizer. It also supports speeds up to 3.5 Gbps in single polarization mode.

Sunil Kar, Vice President of Wireless Communications at Xilinx, said, “This solution provides the key features and performance required for customers to accelerate the development of next-generation wireless solutions. Xilinx and BEEcube will continue to collaborate to provide a scalable platform that achieves maximum digital integration to meet the evolving backhaul needs of both companies’ customers using future technologies such as 5G.”

Experts from Xilinx and BEEcube will present this new prototyping platform at the Mobile World Congress, held in Barcelona, Spain, from March 2 to 5. For inquiries or to schedule a meeting, please contact David Hawke (dhawke@xilinx.com) or David Squires (dsquires@beecube.com).

Supply timing

This comprehensive millimeter-wave prototyping platform solution is currently available from BEEcube. Further details are available at www.beecube.com/products/BEE7.asp. Further details regarding the 256QAM millimeter wave modem IP can be found at www.xilinx.com/products/intellectual-property/millimeter-wave-modem.html.