IEEE Solid-State Circuits Magazine - Winter 2014 - 29

and enabling simplifications. This time honored
analysis tradition has
become increasingly rare
in the industry today. A
brief example is shown.
Refer to Figure 8.
In summary, Professor "Bob" Meyer's deep
knowledge of the technical literature, vast circuit design experience
and superior ability to
analyze and simplify has
led to a large number of
commercially successful
products. His techniques
have enabled a generation of engineers to build
ever more complex products, such as current
RFIC SoCs. When challenged, Bob often tells
you, "We are from Berkeley, we can do it". When
asked how he arrived at
a breakthrough design
in a week, Bob will say,
'well, I have been thinking about the problem
for 30 years".

(c)

Bob also designed precision and
effective drivers for ADCs and for RF
PAs as well as many more blocks that
were integrated into various SoCs.
In writing this article I am
reminded of the great many product definers, designers, applications engineers, test engineers and
others that have contributed or led
the projects described. I know Bob
would want to recognize each of
you for your contributions even if
not mentioned by name here. Only
two of Bob's patents have been outlined in this article but almost all
were implemented in commercial
products. I also want to mention
that most of Bob's work involves
hand analysis with good old pen and
paper, well before any SPICE simulations are run. Bob's hand analysis
often combines device modeling,
optimal circuit architectures, signal
processing and math calculations,

References

[1] R. G. Meyer, R. Eschenbach and R. Chin, "A
wide-band ultralinear amplifier from 3 to
300 MHz," IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits, vol.
SC-9, no. 4, pp. 167-175, Aug. 1974.
[2] R. G. Meyer and M. L. Stephens, "Distortion
in variable-capacitance diodes," IEEE J. SolidState Circuits, vol. SC-10, no. 1, pp. 47-54,
Feb. 1975.
[3] R. G. Meyer and R. A. Blauschild, "A fourterminal wideband monolithic amplifier,"
IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits, vol. SC-16, no.
6, pp. 634-638, Dec. 1981.
[4] R. G. Meyer and R. A. Blauschild, "A wideband low-noise monolithic transimpedance amplifier," IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits,
vol. SC-21, no. 4, pp. 530-533, Aug.
1986.
[5] R. G. Meyer and R. A. Blauschild, et al., "A
wideband class-B video output driver,"
IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits, vol. 24, no. 6,
pp. 1529-1538, Dec. 1989.
[6] N. Nguyen and R. G. Meyer, "Si IC-compatible
inductors and LC passive filters," IEEE J.
Solid-State Circuits, vol. 25, no. 4, pp. 1028-
1031, Aug. 1990.
[7] R. G. Meyer and W. D. Mack, "A DC to 1-GHz
differential monolithic variable-gain
amplifier," IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits, vol.
26, no. 11, pp. 1673-1680, Nov. 1991.
[8] "Active bypass for inhibiting highfrequency supply voltage variations in integrated circuits," U.S. patent 5,049,764,
Sept. 17, 1991.

[9] N. Nguyen and R. G. Meyer, "A 1.8 GHz
monolithic LC voltage-controlled oscillator," IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits, vol. 27, no.
3, pp. 444-450, Mar. 1992.
[10] W. D. Mack and R. G. Meyer, "New ESD protection schemes for BiCMOS processes
with application to cellular radio design,"
in Proc. IEEE Int. Symp. Circuits and Systems, May 1992, pp. 2699-2702.
[11] R. G. Meyer and W. D. Mack, "A wideband
low-noise variable-gain BiCMOS transimpedance amplifier," IEEE J. Solid-State
Circuits, vol. 29, no. 6, pp. 701-706, June
1994.
[12] W. D. Mack and R. G. Meyer, "Design techniques for 1GHz downconversion ICs fabricated in a 1µm 13GHz BiCMOS process,"
in Analog Circuit Design. Boston: Kluwer,
1994, pp. 247-262.
[13] R. G. Meyer and W. D. Mack, "Monolithic
AGC loop for a 160 Mb/s transimpedance
amplifier," IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits, vol.
31, no. 9, pp. 1331-1335, Sept. 1996.
[14] R. G. Meyer, W. D. Mack and J. Hageraats, "A
2.5 GHz BiCMOS transceiver for wireless
LAN," IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits, vol. 32,
no. 12, pp. 2097-2104, Dec. 1997.
[15] "RMS detector with automatic gain control,"
U.S. patent 7,994,840, Aug. 9, 2011.
[16] R. A. Blauschild and R. G. Meyer, "A low
power, 5V, 150 MHz PLL with improved
linearity," in IEEE Int. Conf. Consumer Electronics Dig., June 1985, pp. 122-123.

About the Author
William D. Mack (S'76-M'79-SM'95)
was born in San Francisco, CA, on
December 12, 1955. He received the
B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineering and computer science from
the University of California (U.C.),
Berkeley, in 1977 and 1979, respectively. He held Teaching Assistant/
Associate positions at U.C. Berkeley,
summer positions at the U.C. Berkeley Space Sciences Laboratory, Ampex
Corporation, and Tektronix IC Design
Group. In 1979, he joined the Philips Signetics Company, Sunnyvale,
CA, where he held positions as Analog Designer, Senior Designer, Bipolar Methodology Manager, BiCMOS
Methodology Manager, and Advanced
Technology Group Manager, Philips
Semiconductors. Since 1997 he has
been with Maxim Integrated, San Jose,
CA where he held positions of Director and Executive Director of Wireless Design. He is currently Managing
Director of Electronic Design Automation (EDA) where his current area of
interest is automating the design process for the engineers at Maxim Integrated. Mr. Mack is a member of Eta
Kappa Nu.

IEEE SOLID-STATE CIRCUITS MAGAZINE

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