Opportunities and Challenges in Utilizing Millimeter-Wave Spectrum for High Speed Wireless Communications

The 60 GHz band has emerged as an international spectrum opportunity for short-range wireless communication networks. In this paper, technology trends that can impact the commercial deployment of systems utilizing millimeter-wave frequency bands are discussed. Millimeter-wave frequency bands have historically been costly to utilize and traditionally used almost exclusively for government and non-consumer products. Recent and ongoing advances in semiconductor technology and low cost high frequency packaging can be leveraged for low cost solutions that enable widespread deployment. An example of such a system operating in the millimeter-wave spectrum where bandwidths of >3 GHz have been achieved. Multi-gigabit data transmission and reception over significant distances has also been realized to demonstrate the potential throughput of such a broadband wireless system.