A TSPC mm-Wave Frequency Divider with up to 50GHz Input Frequency in 12nm FinFET Bulk CMOS

This paper presents a digital frequency divider that utilizes two dynamic TSPC flip-flops for a division ratio of four. The circuit operates over a wide supply voltage range spanning from 0.4V to 1.0V and reaches operating frequencies of at least 50 GHz limited by measurement equipment. The circuit draws 560 µA from a 0.7V supply and achieves a locking range of above 48 GHz with a fixed bias and supply voltage. The demonstrated divider circuit is fabricated in a 12nm Bulk CMOS FinFET node and occupies a core area of only 2.7µm², while achieving similar performance to RF frequency dividers fabricated in SOI process nodes. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the presented circuit is the first mm-wave frequency divider built in a FinFET process reaching an operating frequency of 50 GHz while having the smallest reported chip area consumption found in literature.