Taking Flight: Peregrine Semiconductor Corporation

In 1979, inventors associated with Hewlett-Packard and CalTech University were awarded a foundational patent on their method for producing a low-defect layout of silicon-on-sapphire (SOS) wafer. However there existed known technical flaws which HP could not resolve. Further research on honing the method, and its significance on the RF industry, were shelved.

Simultaneously, under the US Government’s technology transfer policy, government entities retained the right to pursue further research work on any patent for government use. As a government employee and head of R&D at a US Navy research laboratory, NELC, Dr. Ronald Reedy and his team resurrected the patent and began research on the recipe details of the SOS process. Within 10 years, Dr. Reedy was certain they had resolved the technical flaws, and an idea for a commercial venture was born.

It was then 1990 and the Cold War had since ended. Under government regulation, Naval project work was allowed to continue if it would benefit the US economy and further the commercial market for such products. Dr. Reedy and his colleague Dr. Mark Burgener, along with funding from Rory Moore, spent a year in development of commercial partnerships to launch the world’s first commercial Silicon-On-Insulator (SOI) RF IC startup company. During this time, the partners acquired the foundational patents from Hewlett-Packard under two simple guidelines: first, the start-up must grant back a license for the subsequent patents, and second, the management team must prove their business plan and their technology identifies and resolves any known technical flaws that HP could not resolve. To this end, a new company took flight. Peregrine Semiconductor Corporation was opened for business with foundry support from market leaders such as Intel, Xilinx, TRW, IBM and Union Carbide. The initial SOS device – the world’s first 1 GHz CMOS RFIC – was delivered in 1993.

Throughout the late 1990s, Peregrine Semiconductor honed its processes and identified key attributes of the SOS process – today known as UltraCMOS™ Technology – which catapulted performance of its RF IC devices. No longer would design engineers need to rely on cumbersome pin-diode solutions or temperamental GaAs ICs. Competitive SOI solutions made progress, however could never quite reach the performance levels demonstrated by the UltraCMOS process. Early adopters of the technology included space and defense engineers for satellite applications. Today, high-volume commercial UltraCMOS wafers are processed in Peregrine’s wholly-owned fabrication facility in Sydney, Australia, as well as in two facilities of Peregrine’s strategic partner Oki Electric in Japan. As of early 2008, more than 200 million UltraCMOS RF ICs have shipped since the company’s inception. The Company’s product portfolio includes the highest performance monolithic RF ICs on the market today and its customer roster includes many of the world’s largest RF module and wireless application OEMs. As further technological advancements such as the recently-announced HaRP™ technology invention -- an innovative enhancement on the next-generation of UltraCMOS -- are made, lower component costs and greater integration of RF signal chain will occur.