POET samples 100G optical engines
Transmit and receive optical engines now under evaluation by leading customers
PIC chip developer POET Technologies has announced samples of 100G LR4 Transmit and 100G LR4 Receive optical engines. Three leading customers have received samples and started product evaluation, while two others have requested samples, according to POET.
The POET 100G LR4 Transmit and Receive optical engines are designed using POET’s Optical Interposer technology and known good optical components, including high-speed DML lasers and photodiodes. The engines meet the IEEE 100GBASE-LR4 standard for transmission up to 10km and are suitable for use in QSFP28, CFP, CFP2 and other high density form factors. 100G LR4 transceivers are a mainstay of the telecom industry, providing key links from data centers to trunk lines.
“We have seen a strong interest in our 100G LR4 optical engines from a good mix of Tier 1 and Tier 2 customers that intend to cost reduce their transceivers to continue supporting the market for the next several years,” said Raju Kankipati, SVP and GM of POET North America. “Our chip-on-board architecture and passive alignment process simplifies the module design to achieve a substantial cost reduction. 100G LR4 has a strong deployment base in both telecom and datacom networks, and we look forward to supplying our engines to our transceiver customers for the entire LR4 lifecycle.”
POET says its chip-on-board, non-hermetic architecture eliminates the costly TOSA (Transmit Optical Subassembly) and ROSA (Receive Optical Subassembly) that are prevalent in most 100G LR4 transceivers today. The engines are assembled using standard pick and place attach process without any need for micro-optic lenses and isolators. No active alignment enables wafer-scale assembly and testing of the engines.
The small size 100G LR4 Transmit optical engine is about 9mm by 4mm and incorporates four DML lasers operating at the LAN-WDM wavelengths as defined by the IEEE 802.3ba standards. The Optical Multiplexer, monitor photodiodes and an FAU (Fiber Array Unit) are included on the engine. The Receive optical engine is 7.5mm by 4.5mm and includes high-speed photodiodes, a demultiplexer and FAU.
POET expects to complete the qualification of 100G LR4 Transmit and Receive optical engines and start volume production at its joint venture partner, Super Photonics, by Q1 2024. The ethernet transceiver market for 100G LR4 is projected by LightCounting to sustain a steady run rate with estimated cumulative sales of $1.6 billion over the 2024-2028 period.
