Effect Photonics announces InP system-on-chip
Effect Photonics, a photonic integration start-up based in the Netherlands, is launching its first product family based on its optical system-on-chip InP technology platform.
The technology can integrate tunable laser sources, arrayed waveguide grating multiplexers, high speed detectors, high speed modulators (including single or multi-stage Mach-Zehnder Modulators), power taps and splitters, as well as channel monitoring.
The first chip in the product family integrates all the active and passive components of a DWDM system. The launch is the culmination of five years work.
Effect Photonics' proposition addresses the soaring demand for affordable bandwidth between datacentres and back from mobile cell towers by bringing Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing technology to the edges of the network.
According to the company, by using the high integration system-on-chip technology, port density can be increased by over six times and operational expenses reduced by 40 percent when compared with existing approaches.
The product family includes transceivers for transmission of 100Gbps over 80km at lowest cost and power, together with high density solutions containing many wavelengths for emerging WDM Access markets in fronthaul, backhaul and NGPON2. Industry standard sockets are supported including CFP and CFP2, meaning the products can be used in existing and future systems.
James Regan, CEO commented: "We could see a bandwidth crunch coming at the edges of the network and knew that DWDM could be the answer, but it had to be done differently, so we developed a holistic solution from the ground up. We have completely re-thought how to tackle the issues of cost, power and density. As well as integrating many optical functions into a single chip, we have reduced the cost and complexity of our packaging resulting in a commercially viable solution.
Regan added "We're now at the sampling stage which is a very exciting time for us, after all the hard work we've put in in the past five years".
Andrew Schmitt, founder and analyst at Cignal Al, said "100 Gbps over 40km to 80km is a significant market opportunity that has no cost effective solution today. This is the next battleground for 100G solutions."
Effect will be showing its new product family at the forthcoming industry event OFC taking place between 20-24 March in Anaheim California.
Effect Photonics is a spin out from the Technical University of Eindhoven.
