Electrical Engineering News and Products

Electronics Engineering Resources, Articles, Forums, Tear Down Videos and Technical Electronics How-To's

OFC 2023 round-up

By

The Optical Fiber Communications Conference (OFC) returned once again to provide a crucial platform for companies of the industry from around the globe. Taken place this past week, March 5th to 9th in San Diego, the annual exhibition and conference presented up-to-date techniques, materials, technologies, and applications in fiber optic technology. Below you will find an accumulation of some of the companies who attended alongside some techniques, materials, etc. they brought forth.

Casela Technologies at OFC 2023 showcased its multi-fiber external laser source (ELS) modules operating at 1310nm and CWDM4 wavelengths. The module uses Casela’s recently announced 200mW uncooled DFB lasers, as well as blind mate optical and electrical connectors supporting OIF’s (Optical Internetworking Forum’s) external laser small form factor pluggable (ELSFP) implementation agreement. It was live at the OIF Co-Packaging (CPO) Interoperability Demonstration.

Coherent exhibited its new products and technology in optical communications networks and sensing. This included an introduction of its 100G PAM4 vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) and photodiode (PD) arrays for 800G short-reach datacom pluggable transceivers and active optical cables (AOCs). The VCSEL arrays are available at 850 nm, 880 nm, 910 nm, and 940 nm, enabling various applications, including bidirectional operation on one fiber to minimize cabling costs in data centers.

Corning Incorporated introduced optical network innovations including a new data center cabling solution, a high-density cable for data center and carrier networks, and an ultra-low-loss optical fiber designed for high-capacity subsea systems and long-haul networks. Corning’s experts showcased the Corning® MiniXtend® cable with flow ribbon technology, the Vascade® EX2500 optical fiber, the EX2500 optical fiber also available in 200-micron outer diameter; their EDGE™ distribution system, and their EDGE™ rapid connect technology.

Additionally, Corning scientist Dr. Ming-Jun Li received the 2023 John Tyndall award for his contributions to advances in optical fiber technology.

Credo and EFFECT Photonics announced plans to collaborate on the development of coherent digital signal processor (DSP) merchant ICs. The two companies will work together to develop coherent DSP products featuring Effect Photonics’ coherent DSP technology and forward error correction (FEC), combined with Credo’s high-speed SerDes, I/Os, analog to digital converters (ADCs), and Digital to Analog Converters (DACs). The first products will target 100G ZR and 100G ZR+ applications, work within the popular QSFP28 optical module’s ultralow 5W power envelope, extend network reach well beyond 80km to support advanced application requirements, target new buildouts, and the imminent 10G upgrade cycle to 100G for service providers, 5G telecom, and fixed-access operators.

Hyper Photonix Ltd used OFC to enter the US optical transceiver market with its Hyper Silicon™ enabled 400G DR4 general availability (and OFC 2023 participation as a first-time exhibitor). The company introduces a family of pluggable optical modules spanning 100G to 400G and beyond for Hyperscale Data Centers, Cloud, Enterprise, and Metro network operators across the United States. Hyper Photonix’ 400G QSFP-DD DR4 module is capable of up to 2km transmission distance.

Jabil Inc. announced that its photonics business unit is expanding its design, manufacturing, and testing capabilities, culminating in the launch of a new active optical cable (AOC) family. Its first 800G AOC product will be available during the second half of 2023; development is underway on 400G AOC products to extend the AOC product line while accommodating a wide range of applications. Also at OFC’23, Jabil showcased its advanced photonics solutions.

Keysight attended OFC 2023 to share how its design, development, validation, and emulation expertise enables R&D professionals to achieve data transmission speeds of 800G, 1.6T, or higher for their optical components and modules. Keysight presented demonstrations in integrated photonics, advanced 1.6T research, 160 gigabaud and beyond research, optical module interoperability, and an 800G/1.6T manufacturing test; using products such as the N4372E Lightwave Component Analyzer, the 110 GHz UXR1102A Infiniium UXR-Series Oscilloscope (in combination with the 120GHz N1046A Electrical Remote Sampling Head Module and the N1000A Digital Communications Analyzer), and the M8050A High-Performance BERT.

Lumentum Holdings Inc. (“Lumentum”) highlighted its portfolio of full band optical tunable transceivers in a live product demonstration, including 10G optical transport network (OTN) SFP+, 25G T-SFP28, and 100G coherent CFP2-DCO bi-directional (BiDi) transceiver modules. The 25G T-SFP28 product incorporates MSA-compliant SmartTunable technology to simplify field deployment tasks by adopting self-tuning algorithms. Lumentum also introduced the industry’s first 100G CFP2-DCO BiDi and 10G OTN modules to address capacity and reach challenges within DAA rollouts. The 100G CFP2-DCO BiDi is a unique product that allows capacity increases that utilize only a single fiber.

Semtech Corporation announced new products in its Signal Integrity portfolio. These products provide customers with the low-power, low-cost, and low-latency solutions needed for hyperscale data center applications, wireless infrastructure, and access and enterprise networking.

New products include:

Sivers Semiconductors AB (“Sivers”) subsidiary, Sivers Photonics, successfully demonstrated its CW-WDM MSA-compliant distributed feedback (DFB) laser arrays with Ayar Labs’ SuperNova™ remote optical source, supporting applications including AI connections, disaggregated data centers, 6G, phased array sensory systems and more. The joint demonstration showcased the 8-wavelength DFB laser array from Sivers Photonics, powering the Ayar Labs SuperNova™ light source as well as two SuperNova™ modules, each with 64 total wavelengths, running without active cooling.

Tektronix, Inc. attended OFC 2023 with its Engineering the Future Booth. At the booth, Tektronix showcased demonstrations of several of its cutting-edge technologies, including a new parametric test of optical modules measuring PSNR/PSRR/PSMR for OSFP/QSFP/SFP high-speed requirements. To meet the optical module standards’ multi-source agreements (MSA) specify compliance test for power supply rejection, Tektronix and PicoTest have partnered to discover ways to inject the proper noise cocktail into optical modules, allowing compliance verification to both the MSAs and to the optical and interconnect standards.

TE Connectivity (TE), in collaboration with Intel, demonstrated its 224 Gbps PAM4 long-reach development efforts. The first demonstration consisted of Intel’s 224 Gbps test chip addressing TE’s over-the-board (OTB) architecture consisting of a 224 near-chip cable assembly. In the second demonstration, the same Intel transceiver addressed an octal small form-factor pluggable (OSFP) based channel consisting of TE’s prototype OSFP 224 Gbps connector and cage with a 1-meter OSFP passive DAC.

Lastly, Viavi Solutions Inc. highlighted new Ethernet testing solutions at OFC 2023, having expanded its presence in the Ethernet testing space with a new high-speed Ethernet (HSE) platform; a multiport solution that complements the industry-leading physical layer testing capabilities of the Viavi ONT-800 Platform. Viavi will also demonstrate the recently released 800G Ethernet technology consortium (ETC) capability of its ONT 800G FLEX XPM Module, supporting testing needs of hyper scalers, data centers, and related applications. A new line of VIAVI Loopback Adapters was also introduced.