A HIGH-SPEED MULTIMODULUS HBT PRESCALER FOR FREQUENCY-SYNTHESIZER APPLICATIONS

A high-speed variable modulus prescaler that divides the input clock frequency by 128 up to 255 with unit step increment has been implemented with HBT technology. A maximum operating frequency of 9.72 GHz with power consumption of 650 mW has been measured. The high-speed performance is attributed to the circuit design to minimize the critical path delay and the intrinsic high-speed characteristics of HBT technology. The high speed and low power features of this prescaler will have an important impact on the synthesizer applications.