Applied Opto Announces DMLs For 400Gbps Transceivers

100 Gbps per lambda PAM4 directty modulated lasers achieve a bandwidth of nearly 30 GHz for data centre applications

Applied Optoelectronics, a provider of fibre-optic access network products, has announced the development of uncooled 100 Gbps per lambda PAM4 directly modulated lasers (DMLs) for 400Gbps optical transceivers.

Transceivers based on DMLs are preferred in data centre applications due to their low power consumption and low cost, compared with solutions based on silicon and other external modulators. The 1310nm 53 Gbaud PAM4 100 Gbps per wavelength lasers leverage AOI’s mature high volume 25 Gbps DML product platform, which was further optimszed to achieve a high laser bandwidth of nearly 30 GHz.

At 100 Gbps, the newly developed lasers exhibit PAM4 eyes with a transmitter dispersion eye closure quaternary (TDECQ) value of 2.5dB, along with other performance metrics that make them suitable for use in 400G DR4, 400G FR4, and 100G DR1 transceivers that meet the IEEE 802.3 Ethernet transceiver standards.

“100 Gbps directly modulated lasers are the key to next generation 400G products for data centre applications. By building on our current PAM4 DML platform development, we are now able to achieve 100 Gbps per lane. We believe that this solution is the best technical approach to extend the cost leadership AOI has engineered at 40G and 100G to 400G and beyond," commented Jun Zheng, Applied Optoelectronics's vice president of R&D.