Symmetrical ESD protection for advanced CMOS technology dedicated to 100 GHz RF application

•Symmetrical ESD RF  protection for advanced CMOS technology is introduced.•We report a design solution with its ESD performances and 100GhZ one.•RF model is also compared with silicon S parameter measurements.

The aim of this paper is to present an ESD solution to address several challenges. The first challenge is to obtain a robust ESD protection with symmetrical response under ±1 kV HBM. And the second one is to reach 100 GHz broadband for RF application. These targets are reached thanks to the BIMOS transistor and dual back to back SCR solution, both compatible with advanced CMOS technology. Moreover, the silicon area and leakage constraints are also addressed. The study is performed through the 3D TCAD simulation and RF models on 40 nm and 32 nm. It also includes Transmission Line Pulse (TLP) and S parameters measurements to characterize and qualify this design and topology.