Production agreement to boost silicon photonics availability
STMicroelectronics is to develop a process at its Crolles fab, pictured, that supports Luxtera's silicon photonics technology. Under the terms of the agreement between the two companies, ST has the right to use Luxtera's silicon photonics technology and will provide Luxtera with a supply chain. This will allow Luxtera to meet growing volume and quality requirements.
The 300mm silicon photonics platform will enable the manufacture of low cost transceivers for data rates in excess of 100Gbit/s, with high density interconnect, low power consumption and the ability to support 1310, 1490 and 1550nm wavelengths.
"Luxtera has found a broad market opportunity for silicon photonics that requires an expanded supply chain and continued technology advancement," said Greg Young, Luxtera's president and ceo. "This will advance our base technology and enable the integration of optical transceivers with SoCs from advanced cmos nodes to deliver photonic enabled SoCs for large scale systems".
Silicon photonics is likely to find application in high speed computing and communications applications. The technology uses silicon manufacturing technology, rather than gallium or indium based compound semiconductors.
