Patent Application
20180006380
This application claims the benefit, under 35 U.S.C. §119 of European Patent Application 16305823.3, filed Jun. 30, 2016.
The proposed apparatus is directed to an interconnection device for feeding an antenna for example an antenna provided on a smart card of a wireless communication device and fed through the circuit board (e.g., main printed circuit board (main PCB)) of the device.
This section is intended to introduce the reader to various aspects of art, which may be related to the present embodiments that are described below. This discussion is believed to be helpful in providing the reader with background information to facilitate a better understanding of the various aspects of the present disclosure. Accordingly, it should be understood that these statements are to be read in this light.
Home-networking devices are becoming more and more important thanks to the various services than can be offered, in particular through the numerous embedded wireless systems, for example, data and video wireless link service thanks to the Wi-Fi systems, home-automation service using standards such as ZigBee, Zwave or 6LoWPAN, device remote control using for instance the Bluetooth or RF4CE protocol, and 3G/LTE based internet gateways. ZigBee is an IEEE 802.15.4-based specification for a suite of high-level communication protocols used to create personal area networks with small, low-power digital radios. Z-Wave is a wireless communications protocol for home automation. 6LoWPAN is an acronym for IPv6 over Low power Wireless Personal Area Networks. RF4CE is a ZigBee application profile.
All of these embedded wireless systems lead to the use of many antennas that have to be integrated inside the device casing with drastic constraints in terms of cost and performance (antenna efficiency, radiation pattern, isolation etc.) and more crucially in terms of space.
The most cost-effective conventional way to introduce an antenna is to print the antennas onto the circuit board of the home networking device. However, most of the board edges, where antennas must be placed to provide proper radiation, are already occupied: the front side is often occupied by numerous push-buttons and a display, the left side by a smart card holder and a hard disk drive (HDD) and, as usual, the rear side has many connectors (e.g., USB, HDMI, Ethernet, DC-in) and the RF (e.g., DTV, cable or satellite) tuner. These electronic components create obstacles to the radiation of radio waves and impair antenna performance Therefore, only the right side is free for on-board antenna integration, which is far from sufficient.
That being the case, the next option is to use off-board antennas, meaning antennas printed on a standalone board, then attached to the device casing and interconnected to the circuit board by means of a miniature coaxial cable. However, because of its high cost this solution is only deployed if no other option is possible.
The proposed apparatus relates to an interconnection device for an antenna in a wireless system for example a home-networking electronic device, such as a set-top-box (STBs), gateway and smart home device. It will be appreciated that the proposed apparatus is not limited to any specific type of device and may be applied to any wireless communication device. The proposed apparatus in some embodiments is applied to an antenna provided on a smart-card of a home-networking device and fed through the circuit board of the device.
The proposed apparatus in accordance with embodiments of the invention takes advantage of the presence of a smart card (SC) holder embedded in a home networking device to integrate onto it the antenna of a wireless system, the antenna being fed by using adequate design metal pins which are attached vertically onto the device circuit board where the wireless system circuit is implemented. These antenna pins can be either integrated in the plastic SC holder that supports already the SC pins or positioned freely under the SC but outside the central rectangular area where the SC chip and contact pads are placed.
According to a first aspect of the invention there is provided an interconnection device including a transmission part for feeding an antenna, the transmission part including a signal feed element and a ground element connectable to a circuit board, a first end of the ground element connectable to the circuit board and a second end of the ground element connectable to the antenna and a first end of the signal feed element connectable to an antenna feeding port on the circuit board and a second end of the signal feed element connectable to an antenna feeding line of the antenna.
In an embodiment the signal feed element and the ground element of the interconnection device are provided at the second end with flexible connector elements engageable with the antenna disposed on a smart card to feed the antenna and biased to hold said smart card in place. The ground element of the interconnection device includes an extension ground element folded away from the ground element such that the extension ground element extends over the signal feed element and the ground element to form a ground plane spaced apart from the signal feed element.
In another embodiment the signal feed element and the ground element extend parallel to each other.
In another embodiment the ground plane of the interconnection device is connectable to the circuit board via a plurality of grounding pins. The signal feed element of the interconnection device is connectable to the circuit board via at least one pin. The signal feed element of the interconnection device connectable to the antenna feeding line via at least one flexible pin.
In another embodiment the antenna disposed on said smart card is operational when the smart card is inserted into a smart card holder. The antenna is a tapered slot antenna.
In another embodiment the ground pins and the signal pin of the interconnection device connectable to the antenna are flexible so as to permit insertion of the smart card into the smart card holder and engage a pinout pad of the smart card and to also engage the antenna feeding line and at least one grounding pad of the antenna disposed on the smart card.
In another embodiment the signal feed element and the ground element of the interconnection device are arranged to form a micro-strip structure. The ground element and the signal feed element of the interconnection device are configured to provide mechanical rigidity and impedance matching from the circuit board to the antenna disposed on a smart card.
In another embodiment the interconnection device is configured to connect the antenna on the smart card to the antenna feeding port of the circuit board.
In another embodiment a device includes a circuit board, the circuit board having an antenna feeding port connectable to an interconnection device, the interconnection device being operational according to any of the above described embodiments.
In another embodiment a system includes a smart card holder for holding a smart card, the smart card having an antenna disposed thereon, an interconnection device and a circuit board, the circuit board having an antenna feeding port connectable to the interconnection device, the interconnection device configured to connect the antenna on the smart card to the antenna feeding port of the circuit board, the interconnection device operational according to any of the above described embodiments.
The proposed method and apparatus is best understood from the following detailed description when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. The drawings include the following figures briefly described below:
It should be understood that the drawing(s) are for purposes of illustrating the concepts of the disclosure and is not necessarily the only possible configuration for illustrating the disclosure.
The present description illustrates the principles of the present disclosure. It will thus be appreciated that those skilled in the art will be able to devise various arrangements that, although not explicitly described or shown herein, embody the principles of the disclosure and are included within its scope.
All examples and conditional language recited herein are intended for educational purposes to aid the reader in understanding the principles of the disclosure and the concepts contributed by the inventor to furthering the art, and are to be construed as being without limitation to such specifically recited examples and conditions.
Moreover, all statements herein reciting principles, aspects, and embodiments of the disclosure, as well as specific examples thereof, are intended to encompass both structural and functional equivalents thereof. Additionally, it is intended that such equivalents include both currently known equivalents as well as equivalents developed in the future, i.e., any elements developed that perform the same function, regardless of structure.
Thus, for example, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that the block diagrams presented herein represent conceptual views of illustrative circuitry embodying the principles of the disclosure. Similarly, it will be appreciated that any flow charts, flow diagrams, state transition diagrams, pseudocode, and the like represent various processes which may be substantially represented in computer readable media and so executed by a computer or processor, whether or not such computer or processor is explicitly shown.
The functions of the various elements shown in the figures may be provided through the use of dedicated hardware as well as hardware capable of executing software in association with appropriate software. When provided by a processor, the functions may be provided by a single dedicated processor, by a single shared processor, or by a plurality of individual processors, some of which may be shared. Moreover, explicit use of the term “processor” or “controller” should not be construed to refer exclusively to hardware capable of executing software, and may implicitly include, without limitation, digital signal processor (DSP) hardware, read only memory (ROM) for storing software, random access memory (RAM), and nonvolatile storage.
Other hardware, conventional and/or custom, may also be included. Similarly, any switches shown in the figures are conceptual only. Their function may be carried out through the operation of program logic, through dedicated logic, through the interaction of program control and dedicated logic, or even manually, the particular technique being selectable by the implementer as more specifically understood from the context.
In the claims hereof, any element expressed as a means for performing a specified function is intended to encompass any way of performing that function including, for example, a) a combination of circuit elements that performs that function or b) software in any form, including, therefore, firmware, microcode or the like, combined with appropriate circuitry for executing that software to perform the function. The disclosure as defined by such claims resides in the fact that the functionalities provided by the various recited means are combined and brought together in the manner which the claims call for. It is thus regarded that any means that can provide those functionalities are equivalent to those shown herein.
A number of devices in accordance with embodiments of the invention will be described in what follows. One device relates to a smart card having disposed thereon an antenna. Another device relates to a smart card holder and a printed circuit board having an antenna feeding (input) port. The printed circuit board is configured to receive an interconnection device in accordance with an embodiment of the invention which interconnects the smart card (having the antenna) inserted into the smart card holder and the antenna feeding (input) port of the printed circuit card.
A smart card is a plastic card that embeds an integrated circuit, providing data storage, personal identification and authentication. It can be used for many purposes and applications, with the most usual being for serving as a credit card. In the particular use case of a wireless communication device, such as a set-top box (STB), the smart card is used as an access control for pay television and encrypted services. The ISO/IEC 7810 is an international standard that has defined several card sizes, with the most widespread being the format ID-1 specifying a size of 85.60×53.98 mm2. All cards have a thickness of 0.76 mm
A smart card is used as an access control by the network service providers (NSPs), providing the appropriate rights to access the services (e.g., TV channels) to which the end-user has subscribed. First, a plastic smart card holder is assembled onto the circuit board. This smart card holder includes four (4) vertical metal pins on each side that are inserted and soldered in the dedicated holes made on the circuit board. These vertical pins are then extended in the horizontal plane by using flexible metal pins, so that when a smart card is inserted into the smart card holder the pins are flexibly put in contact with the respective eight (8) pinout pads of the smart card.
Embodiments of the proposed devices will now be described, by way of example, and with reference to the
Smart card 110 of
One can notice here the large area available on the smart card for the integration of the radiating element—an area, which most of the time, is not available on the circuit board. It should be noted that more than one antenna can be embedded on the smart card, addressing, for instance, MIMO (multiple input multi output) applications. The above described approach offers additional advantages. For example, in comparison with a conventional solution, which uses an off-board fiberglass reinforced epoxy (FR4) based printed antenna with a coaxial cable for interconnection to the circuit board, the above described antenna-board is much more cost-effective with lower insertion loss and therefore better radiation efficiency. It can be noticed here the antenna feeding (input) port is placed intentionally outside of the smart card pinout pads longitudinal axis, since the goal is to avoid the antenna interconnecting metal pins rubbing the smart card pinout pads when the user inserts the smart card into the smart card holder. This will be shown and described further below.
The bottom side of the two metal strips includes four (4) pins that are dedicated to be plugged into respective hosting holes of the circuit board 140 as shown in
The design described in detail above has been fully simulated using the HFSS™ (High Frequency Structural Simulator) 3D electromagnetic tool, in order to demonstrate the high level of antenna performance that can be achieved with the proposed apparatus.
The proposed apparatus offers another not negligible advantage. Most of the time, once the smart card 110 is inserted inside the wireless communication device, a wide part remains outside the housing. Therefore, when the housing is metal 1605 based, with an antenna 405 remaining on the outside part of the smart card such as shown in
Processor 1720 provides computation functions for the wireless communication device, such as the one depicted in
User interface and display 1710 is driven by interface circuit 1715. The interface 1710 is used as a multimedia interface having both audio and video capability to display streamed or downloaded audio and/or video and/or multimedia content obtained via network interface 1725 and connection 1705 to a network.
Memory 1745 can act as a repository for memory related to any of the methods that incorporate the functionality of the media device. Memory 1745 can provide the repository for storage of information such as program memory, downloads, uploads, or scratchpad calculations as well as the storage of streamed or downloaded content including audio, video and multimedia content. Those of skill in the art will recognize that memory 1745 may be incorporated all or in part of processor 1720. Network interface 1725 has both receiver and transmitter elements for communication as known to those of skill in the art.
Network interface 1725 may include a wireless interface to communicate wirelessly to transmit requests for audio and/or video and/or multimedia content and receive the requested audio and/or video and/or multimedia content. In order to do so, a radio frequency interface may be provided. The radio frequency interface transmits and receives using an antenna, which may use a radio frequency wideband bandpass filter. The antenna may be disposed on a smart card, which is inserted into a smart card holder. The radio frequency interface may include any necessary software, hardware or firmware to control and communicate with the antenna on the smart card.
Other design of the vertical interconnecting parts can be used, for instance using three separate metal strips to form a ground-signal-ground coplanar structure. The interconnecting parts can be embedded into the smart card holder such as its metal pins. Instead of using an antenna printed on a thin film substrate attached to the smart card, the antenna design can be etched directly onto the smart card by using a plastic metallization process. The antenna can alternatively be excited by coupling (instead of direct contact) from the circuit board by using an adequate metal strip design. Also a 3D antenna instead of fully planar antenna as described above can be used.
It is to be understood that the proposed method and apparatus may be implemented in various forms of hardware, software, firmware, special purpose processors, or a combination thereof. Special purpose processors may include application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), reduced instruction set computers (RISCs) and/or field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). Preferably, the proposed method and apparatus is implemented as a combination of hardware and software. Moreover, the software is preferably implemented as an application program tangibly embodied on a program storage device. The application program may be uploaded to, and executed by, a machine comprising any suitable architecture. Preferably, the machine is implemented on a computer platform having hardware such as one or more central processing units (CPU), a random access memory (RAM), and input/output (I/O) interface(s). The computer platform also includes an operating system and microinstruction code. The various processes and functions described herein may either be part of the microinstruction code or part of the application program (or a combination thereof), which is executed via the operating system. In addition, various other peripheral devices may be connected to the computer platform such as an additional data storage device and a printing device.
It should be understood that the elements shown in the figures may be implemented in various forms of hardware, software or combinations thereof. Preferably, these elements are implemented in a combination of hardware and software on one or more appropriately programmed general-purpose devices, which may include a processor, memory and input/output interfaces. Herein, the phrase “coupled” is defined to mean directly connected to or indirectly connected with through one or more intermediate components. Such intermediate components may include both hardware and software based components.
It is to be further understood that, because some of the constituent system components and method steps depicted in the accompanying figures are preferably implemented in software, the actual connections between the system components (or the process steps) may differ depending upon the manner in which the proposed method and apparatus is programmed Given the teachings herein, one of ordinary skill in the related art will be able to contemplate these and similar implementations or configurations of the proposed method and apparatus.
For purposes of this application and the claims, using the exemplary phrase: “at least one of A. B and C,” the phrase means “only A, or only B, or only C, or any combination of A, B and C.”
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 16305823.3 | Jun 2016 | EP | regional |
