Estonia, Press-release, Technology

FPGAs are becoming increasingly popular as design platforms for wireless communications solutions due to their rapidly declining cost, availability of design tools to enable fast time-to-market, and reprogrammability in the field. Rapid technology lifecycles require flexible design solutions to anticipate market choice and to quickly respond to emerging windows of opportunity. With the transition from 2.5G to 3G/4G/LTE the market for wireless communication products is experiencing a major shift. Implementing products on FPGA devices enables exploitation of new opportunities via short time-to-market, maintaining the possibility to redesign product functionality according to evolving market requirements. The major FPGA providers are Altera, Xilinx, Lattice Semiconductors and Actel.

“When talking to our customers we see clearly that FPGA is becoming an important alternative platform to ASIC based microwave modems” said BC Tarmo Pihl, VP for Business Development and International Sales of Modesat. “By extending our product line to support Xilinx, we aim to serve a larger customer base, as Altera and Xilinx are the leading brands on FPGA market”. With the release of the Xilinx based 256QAM modulator-demodulator DSP Core, a new version of the Modesat Evaluation Board (EVB) has also been introduced. Modesat also expects to release its 1024QAM modem DSP Core in the coming months to complement the Altera-based product released in March 2009. The EVB enables verification of the performance of Modesat’s DSP Core and can be easily integrated into customers’ RF (radio frequency) part for initial testing.

Modesat develops and provides FPGA-based high capacity modulator-demodulator DSP Cores and SoC (System-on-Chip) solutions for PDH/SDH and Gigabit Ethernet Radio based on its patented PilotSyncTM technology. This new technology significantly increases data throughput by permitting the use of high order adaptive modulation schemes (1024QAM or greater), maintaining operability at very poor communication link conditions (down to SNR as low as –6 dB) and ensuring high reliability. PilotSyncTM technology reduces the Bill of Material (BOM) for equipment manufacturers due to its simple electronic design, and also decreases energy consumption.

Modesat’s products are available to communications equipment manufacturers and solution providers through Modesat’s representative offices worldwide.