DR HELENA DIEZ-Y-RIEGA & DR. JON PUGH OPTICA INTERVIEW
electronic components together requires extremely precise alignment, often at sub-micron accuracy, while maintaining high throughput and yield. As photonics moves closer to the compute through co-packaged optics and optical I/O, packaging is becoming just as critical as the photonic devices themselves. Success will depend on scalable assembly, automated alignment, wafer-level integration and high-volume manufacturing processes borrowed from the semiconductor industry. Closely linked to this is testing. Unlike conventional semiconductor devices, photonic assemblies require both optical and electrical characterisation throughout the manufacturing process. Developing fast, automated test methodologies that maintain high yields without significantly increasing cost will be essential for large-scale deployment. Reliability, serviceability and optical connectivity are equally important. Hyperscale operators are understandably concerned about increasing the “blast radius” of a component failure. If an optical engine fails, they do not want to replace an expensive switch ASIC or complete networking system. Future architectures therefore need to minimise the blast radius by allowing optical engines to be serviced or replaced independently wherever possible, while still delivering the bandwidth density and integration benefits of co-packaged optics. Closely related to this is the challenge of scalable, low-loss, detachable fibre-to-chip I/O. Hyperscale operators require optical connections that can be manufactured at volume, installed efficiently and serviced in the field. Developing robust, low-loss, high- density detachable optical interfaces is therefore fundamental, not only to simplify deployment and maintenance, but also to reducing the operational impact of component failures by allowing optical engines to be replaced without disturbing the surrounding electronics. Finally, there is the challenge of manufacturing scalability. Today’s photonic packaging relies heavily on active optical alignment, which delivers excellent performance but is relatively slow and requires significant capital investment in specialised assembly equipment. As production volumes increase into the millions of optical engines, OSATs are increasingly concerned that simply scaling the amount of active alignment equipment is neither economically nor operationally sustainable. One of the industry’s biggest opportunities is therefore to transition from active to passive alignment through advanced packaging innovations. Achieving
passive, high-yield, wafer-scale assembly while maintaining low optical loss will be a key step towards reducing manufacturing costs, increasing throughput and enabling the volumes required for next-generation AI infrastructure.
manufacturing costs while maintaining the yields and reliability demanded by hyperscale operators. These manufacturing innovations are likely to have just as much impact on scalability as the photonic devices themselves. Ultimately, we are extremely optimistic, and with good reason. The industry has moved beyond proving that photonics works. The focus has now shifted to building a resilient, multi-vendor manufacturing ecosystem capable of producing photonic technologies at semiconductor scale. The commitment we are now seeing from the world’s leading foundries gives us confidence that this transition is well underway and will play a pivotal role in enabling future generations of AI infrastructure. BD How is Optica helping to advance photonic solutions for data centres, and what overarching role do you see the organisation playing in shaping this space? Optica’s role is deliberately not that of a vendor. As a non-profit scientific organisation, Optica’s role is to advance optics and photonics worldwide by bringing together OP researchers, industry, government and end users to accelerate innovation and technology adoption. Our objective is not to promote individual companies or technologies, but to help the entire ecosystem address common technical challenges and identify opportunities for collaboration. Looking ahead, we believe Optica’s role will become increasingly important as photonics moves further into mainstream semiconductor manufacturing and AI infrastructure. The pace of innovation is accelerating rapidly, and ensuring that ideas, expertise and best practice are shared across the global community will be essential to overcoming the manufacturing, packaging and supply chain challenges that lie ahead. Our role is to help bring the right people together so that the industry can move forward collectively.
How scalable do you believe current photonic technologies are for future generations of
BD
data centres?
We believe photonic technologies are highly scalable, but future success will depend less on the
OP
devices themselves and more on the industry’s ability to manufacture and integrate them using high-volume semiconductor processes. From a technology perspective, there is little doubt that the roadmap is in place. Silicon photonics has demonstrated a clear path to supporting future generations of AI infrastructure, and optical technologies are already moving beyond traditional pluggable transceivers into co-packaged optics and optical I/O. The question is no longer whether the technology can scale, but whether the manufacturing ecosystem can scale with it. This is why the increasing commitment from leading semiconductor foundries is so significant. While Intel has demonstrated the manufacturability of silicon photonics over many years, we are seeing companies such as TSMC through its COUPE platform, GlobalFoundries through its SCALE CPO solution, Tower Semiconductor, and Samsung Foundry all making substantial investments in silicon photonics and advanced packaging. Their involvement represents a fundamental shift from photonics being a specialist technology to becoming part of mainstream semiconductor manufacturing. As these foundries expand their photonics platforms, they bring proven expertise in process control, yield improvement, high-volume manufacturing and global supply chains - exactly the capabilities needed to support hyperscale AI deployments. Equally important is the development of a complete manufacturing ecosystem. Success will require foundries, OSATs, equipment manufacturers, materials suppliers, packaging specialists and fibre connectivity companies to scale together. No single organisation can deliver this transformation in isolation, and continued collaboration across the value chain will be essential. We also expect manufacturing processes to evolve significantly over the coming years. Advances in wafer-level packaging, automated assembly, passive optical alignment and high-throughput testing will be critical to reducing
Dr Helena Diez-y-Riega
Dr. Jon Pugh Technical Director for PICs and Quantum Technologies, Optica
Technical Director for Laser and Life Science Technologies, Optica
www.opticalconnectionsnews.com
19
ISSUE 44 | Q3 2026
Made with FlippingBook Annual report maker