The RF industry is large and healthy, spanning a wide range not only of technologies and products, but a wide range of applications as well; including telecommunications, consumer devices, civilian radar and critical services, aerospace, and (largest of all) defense. The range of products available is staggering, with a highly fragmented market and customer space, each offering or requiring products that vary wildly in cost, size, and performance.
The conventional semiconductor technologies dominate the industry because of their small size and generally low cost. The large, expensive waveguide and ferrite-based products, by contrast, are used primarily for infrastructure, critical systems, and defense applications where high performance brings operational cost savings or safety returns. RF MEMS, by contrast, appears to offer many of the performance advantages of high-end components, yet promises the small size and low cost enjoyed by semiconductor devices. This chapter helps to guide the user in making an informed decision about whether to invest in the performance offered by RF MEMS or leverage the low cost of traditional technologies.
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