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Peregrine Introduces UltraCMOS® RF Power Limiters, the Industry’s First Monolithic Alternative to Discrete, PIN-Diode Limiters

Peregrine’s New Architecture Delivers Turnkey, Power-Limiter Solutions That Outperform GaAs-Based Limiters in Protecting Systems From Excessive RF Power, Intentional Jammers and ESD Events

BEIJING — (BUSINESS WIRE) — April 7, 2014 — EDI CON – In Booth #512 Peregrine Semiconductor Corp. (NASDAQ: PSMI), founder of RF SOI (silicon on insulator) and pioneer of advanced RF solutions, debuts its new line of UltraCMOS® RF power limiters, including PE45140 and PE45450 slated for release in May. Peregrine’s power limiters represent the industry’s first turnkey, monolithic solutions to provide an alternative to discrete, PIN-diode limiters based on gallium arsenide (GaAs). UltraCMOS power limiters deliver simple, repeatable and reliable protection ideal for test-and-measurement, land-mobile-radio (LMR), wireless-infrastructure, military and radar systems.

“Peregrine makes best-in-class RF products, and we are pleased to extend that heritage into the new category of power limiters announced at EDI CON today,” says Duncan Pilgrim, director of marketing at Peregrine. “Our customers continuously find that incumbent GaAs-based RF solutions do not rise to the challenge of new complexity in the market, and they are investing in Peregrine’s SOI technology as fast as we can develop new options like this.”

Turnkey Monolithic Architecture Delivers Unprecedented Benefits

On a chip eight times smaller than the board space required by discrete, PIN-diode solutions, Peregrine’s new power limiters provide a 10-100X improvement in response and recovery time; deliver greater than 40 dB improvement in linearity (IP3); and offer a 20X improvement in ESD (electrostatic discharge) protection.

Of particular interest to RF designers, Peregrine’s power limiters save PCB space with a small form factor; reduce BoM (bill of materials) by eliminating the need for extra components; and improve time to market by reducing in-design time and costs. They also beat existing solutions in RF performance, including higher linearity to eliminate signal distortion, high ESD to ensure high reliability, wide bandwidth to enable design flexibility and fast response and recovery times to ensure robust protection of power-sensitive components. Finally, because Peregrine’s power limiters are based on UltraCMOS instead of GaAs, they can be closely integrated with other UltraCMOS RF components.

This table illustrates how Peregrine’s new UltraCMOS power limiters compare to GaAs-based PIN diode solutions:

Attributes  

UltraCMOS
Power
Limiter

 

GaAS PIN
Diode Power
Limiters

Small form factor   Yes   No
Requires no external components   Yes   No
Superior ESD rating   Yes   No
Adjustable limiting threshold   Yes   No
Power reflection mode   Yes   No
Protection in unpowered conditions   Yes   Yes
Excellent linearity   Yes   No
Sub-nanosecond response time   Yes   No
Wide bandwidth support   Yes   No
High power handling   Yes   Yes
Low insertion loss   Yes   Yes
   

Several Industries Require Repeatable and Reliable Power Protection

Peregrine’s UltraCMOS power limiters can protect:

In order to achieve repeatable and reliable power protection, customers currently face challenges because it takes so long to design and validate PIN-diode power-limiter circuits and the multiple external components this architecture requires. With Peregrine’s new, all-in-one architecture, customers will be able to significantly reduce time to market and cost.

Availability

On display at EDI CON Booth #512, Peregrine plans to release the first two of its UltraCMOS power limiters in May 2014:

Both power limiters feature an adjustable limiting threshold, unbiased power limiting and operation in two modes – power limiting or power reflecting. Images, videos and additional details are available in our press kit.

USE OF FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

This press release contains forward-looking statements regarding our management's future expectations, beliefs, intentions, goals, strategies, plans and prospects. Such statements constitute “forward-looking” statements which are subject to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The achievement of the matters covered by such forward-looking statements involves risks, uncertainties and assumptions. If any of these risks or uncertainties materialize or if any of the assumptions prove incorrect, our actual results, performance or achievements could be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, our dependence on a limited number of customers for a substantial portion of our revenues; intellectual property risks; intense competition in our industry; our ability to develop and introduce new and enhanced products on a timely basis and achieve market acceptance of those products; consumer acceptance of our customers’ products that incorporate our solutions; our lack of long-term supply contracts and dependence on limited sources of supply; and potential decreases in average selling prices for our products.

For further information regarding risks and uncertainties associated with Peregrine’s business, please refer to the filings that we make with the Securities and Exchange Commission from time to time, including those set forth in the section entitled “Risk Factors” in our Form 10-K for the year ended December 29, 2012 and additional information that will be set forth in our Form 10-K that will be filed for the year ended December 28, 2013, which should be read in conjunction with these financial results. These documents are available on the SEC Filings section of the Investor Relations section of our website at http://investors.psemi.com/. Please also note that forward-looking statements represent our management's beliefs and assumptions only as of the date of this press release. Except as required by law, we assume no obligation to update these forward-looking statements publicly, or to update the reasons actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements, even if new information, becomes available in the future.

ABOUT PEREGRINE SEMICONDUCTOR

Peregrine Semiconductor (NASDAQ: PSMI), founder of RF SOI (silicon on insulator), is a leading fabless provider of high-performance, integrated RF solutions. Since 1988 Peregrine and its founding team have been perfecting UltraCMOS® technology – a patented, advanced form of SOI – to deliver the performance edge needed to solve the RF market’s biggest challenges, such as linearity. With products that deliver best-in-class performance and monolithic integration, Peregrine is the trusted choice for market leaders in automotive, broadband, industrial, Internet of Things, military, mobile devices, smartphones, space, test-and-measurement equipment and wireless infrastructure. Peregrine holds more than 170 filed and pending patents and has shipped more than 2 billion UltraCMOS units. For more information, visit http://www.psemi.com.

The Peregrine Semiconductor name, logo, and UltraCMOS are registered trademarks of Peregrine Semiconductor Corporation in the U.S.A., and other countries. All other trademarks mentioned herein are the property of their respective owners.


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Peregrine Semiconductor
Elizabeth Brown, 619.993.4648
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