Philips unrolls new ultra-thin leadless packages

Royal Philips Electronics has announced two new packages for Logic and RF applications--the MicroPak II and SOD882T—touted to be breakthrough products in ultra-thin leadless packaging.

MicroPakII is said to be the worlds smallest leadless Logic package at a size of 1mm², with a pad pitch of 0.35mm. The SOD882T for RF applications is an even smaller package with a footprint of 0.6mm². This new ultra-thin leadless package (UTLP) platform allows designers of consumer electronics products the flexibility to add more functionality into smaller spaces, the company said.

By developing a special substrate and a dedicated etching process, Philips said it is able to meet the industry demand for smaller product design, both in square area and height. The specially developed substrate enables a 33 percent reduction in package size for the MicroPakII over its predecessor MicroPak, freeing board space for additional components and functions, the company added. With a contact area of 0.298mm², it also provides a contact-footprint ratio of 30 percent, nearly double that of most leaded and leadless packages in its class. As a result, the end-packages are less likely to be dislodged from the boards should they be subject to sudden impact, the company explained.

According to Philips, MicroPakII also delivers the highest performance in shear and pull tests--73 percent better in shear strength and 66 percent better in pull strength than its nearest leadless competitor. This further enables OEMs to design and market durable, smaller, thinner and lighter mobile devices.

The special, patent-pending substrate technology from Philips allows for an increased "silicon to plastic" ratio, enabling the use of bigger crystals within the same footprint, increasing performance without sacrificing valuable board space, the company said. UTLP also offers less parasitic capacitance and inductance, making it suited for high frequency applications operating up to 24GHz.

Philips ultra-thin packages are available today for diodes and transistors in RF applications at a height of 0.4mm, which can be used within mobile phones, MP3 players, PDAs, notebook PCs, TV and radio tuners, as well as test and measurement equipment and other small-form-factor wireless portable devices. The UTLP platform can also meet the demand for extremely thin and small, highly integrated power management products for mobile phones and portable media players.

Philips MicroPakII (1-by-1-by-0.5mm) is already in volume production, and is priced at 29 cents in quantities of 10,000. The Philips SOD882T RF package (1-by-0.6-by-0.4mm) is also currently in volume production.