The Filtronic Solid State FMA500 is a high-gain pre-driver pHEMT amplifier that operates from DC to 23 GHz. This five-stage travelling wave amplifier provides 13 dB nominal small signal gain and 4 V peak-to-peak NRZ output at bit rates to 12.5 Gb/sec. The FMA500 is designed as the pre-driver stage for OC-192 MZ modulator driver amplifiers for optical data communication applications, and can be cascaded with the FMA501 Driver MMIC to provide 30 dB of voltage gain. The FMA500 can also be used as an EA driver amplifier or as a transimpedance amplifier (TIA) for photoreceiver applications.