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Munich, Germany,
March
3, 2011:
Silicon Line GmbH, a leading provider of ultra-low power analogue ICs,
today announced that it has brought to market the SL83014, an optical
bridge IC targeted at mobile phones using the latest MIPI® Alliance
based D-PHY standard. The IC is used to optically connect displays,
cameras and application processors and enables the replacement of
traditional electrical connectors with optical connectors.
Data rates inside a mobile phone are exploding due to consumer demand
for high resolution displays, full HD video cameras and 3D displays
and cameras. These extremely high data rates generate significant EMI
when traditional electrical cables are used to transport the data.
This can degrade the RF performance of the phone. Optical connectors
do not suffer from these EMI issues. In addition, optical connectors
are thin, small and flexible and so enable slim form factor designs
and also designs with moving parts such as hinges or sliders.
“We expect to see the first mobile phones using optical connectors
entering the market in 2011”, says Ian Jackson, Senior Manager Sales
and Marketing at Silicon Line. “Mobile phone manufacturers are driving
the requirements for optical link technology and Silicon Line is
pleased to enable this trend”, he added.
“Continued
development around the MIPI D-PHY speaks to the strength of the
specification”, said Joel Huloux, Chairman of the Board for MIPI
Alliance. “We are pleased to see the technology leveraged in optical
bridge applications such as Silicon Line’s.”
The SL83014 can be configured as a serializer or a de-serializer. When
used as a serializer the SL83014 accepts up to 4 data lanes and a
clock lane from a D-PHY master device and serializes the data for
transfer over a high speed optical link. When used as a de-serializer
the SL83014 accepts the data from the high speed optical link and
de-serializes the data into a maximum of 4 data lanes and a clock lane
which are then connected to a D-PHY slave device. In this way optical
D-PHY connectors can be used instead of electrical connectors.
Both HS (high speed, from 80 Mbps to 1 Gbps) and LP (low power, up to
10 Mbps) forward data transfer modes are supported. The SL83014 also
includes an optional galvanic link feature which can be used for
bi-directional LP data transfer. The ultra-low power consumption of
SL83014 makes it ideally suited for use within mobile phones.
An SL83014 based optical bridge can be used to connect an application
processor to a display in order to transmit image data to the display
using the MIPI® Alliance DSI (Display Serial Interface) standard. It
can also be used to connect a camera module to the applications
processor in order to transmit image data to the applications
processor using the MIPI® Alliance CSI (Camera Serial Interface)
standard.
A complete D-PHY optical bridge module can be constructed using the
SL83014 together with the SL82026T VCSEL driver and SL82016e
transimpedance amplifier ICs from Silicon Line.
The SL83014 is available as bare die or packaged in a very small
micro-BGA package and is sampling now.
About Silicon Line GmbH
Silicon Line is a Germany based fabless analog IC company, specialized
in providing innovative, ultra-low power IC solutions in standard
CMOS-technology.
Silicon Line is located at Elsenheimerstrasse 48,
D-80687 Munich, Germany.
Additional information is available at
www.silicon-line.com.
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