Luxtera to offer high-performance silicon photonics platform with TSMC

Applications and Research

Luxtera, a pioneer in silicon photonics developments, has partnered with TSMC for next-generation silicon photonics manufacturing. This cooperation enables key technologies for future cloud, mobile infrastructure, enterprise, and high-performance computing platforms.

The companies are together developing what they are calling “an innovative silicon photonics technology platform” intended to more than double optical link performance while enabling four times the raw data rate of any competing silicon photonics solution.

The new platform will also enable full system-on-chip integration of optical interconnect with the CMOS logic for applications including network switch, storage, or compute — widely viewed as the next evolutionary step.

Combined with TSMC silicon manufacturing excellence and scale, Luxtera’s silicon photonic designs enable optical interconnects with significantly higher performance at lower cost and power that are critical to scaling future data centres and 5G mobile networks.

Luxtera’s newest platform will be used in a full suite of next-generation silicon photonics solutions to deliver 100G per lane optical interconnects, beginning with the deployment of 100GBase-DR and 400GBase-DR4 transceivers in 2018, and expanding to include other standards based solutions to service 25G, 50G, 100G, 200G, 400G, 800G, and 1 terabit optical interconnects.

As a companion to the new silicon photonics technologies, Luxtera will be leveraging TSMC’s 7nm CMOS to ensure best-in-class performance at the lowest power across its broader product portfolio.

“TSMC recognises the growing importance of optical interconnect for our customers,” said Dr. BJ Woo, TSMC’s VP Business Development. “Our collaboration with Luxtera will help us to deliver a silicon photonics technology platform to this market that addresses critical industry needs. We are pleased that our work together is quickly demonstrating results.”

Greg Young, CEO and President of Luxtera, added, “Together, we will enable unparalleled innovation in the silicon photonics industry. Cloud computing and mobile networking will continue to drive dramatic increases in both the rate and volume of optical interconnects. Meeting these needs will require mass proliferation of silicon photonics solutions, with CMOS manufacturing a crucial ingredient for success.”