en.Wedoany.com Reported - Sweden's Sivers Semiconductors announced on June 2 a strategic partnership with US-based GlobalFoundries (GF) to integrate its laser array technology into GF's silicon photonics platform and SCALE optical engine solution, targeting the high-speed optical interconnect, co-packaged optics, and pluggable optical module markets for AI data centers with next-generation connectivity solutions.
The focus of this collaboration is on optical interconnect links within AI data centers. Sivers' laser arrays will be integrated into GF's silicon photonics platform reference design and incorporated into GF's SCALE optical engine solution for next-generation photonic sub-components and optical engine architectures. GF's SCALE solution, which stands for Silicon Photonics Co-packaged Advanced Light Engine, targets co-packaged optics applications by combining integrated photonic devices, coarse wavelength division multiplexing (CWDM), dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM), and advanced packaging capabilities to improve bandwidth density and system scalability. For AI data centers, data traffic between servers, accelerators, switch chips, and storage systems is rapidly increasing, placing greater pressure on traditional copper interconnects in terms of distance, power consumption, signal integrity, and system heat dissipation. The value of silicon photonics and optical engine solutions lies in using optical signals to handle more high-speed data transmission tasks, further improving connection efficiency within racks, between racks, and at switching nodes. Sivers has deep expertise in high-precision lasers and RF beamforming, while GF possesses capabilities in silicon photonics manufacturing, advanced packaging, and global wafer fabrication. The combination of Sivers' laser arrays with GF's silicon photonics platform indicates that the underlying hardware for AI data center networks is evolving beyond simply improving switch chip performance to encompass coordinated advancements in light sources, optical modules, packaging, and system-level interconnect architectures.
The partnership covers co-packaged optics, linear pluggable optics, and other emerging data center interconnect solutions, targeting the pluggable optical module market, projected to be worth approximately $25 billion by 2030.
The expansion of AI computing clusters is reshaping data center network architectures. In the past, data center traffic was more centered around external access, cloud services, and traditional server clusters. However, large model training and inference have led to a higher proportion of east-west traffic, where large numbers of GPUs, XPUs, and switching equipment need to complete parameter synchronization, data distribution, and task scheduling within extremely short timeframes. If the network layer suffers from insufficient bandwidth or latency jitter, expensive accelerators will experience communication delays, reducing overall computing utilization. Consequently, silicon photonics technology has become a critical component in AI infrastructure, enabling tighter integration of optical communication capabilities into chips, packaging, and switching systems, thereby reducing transmission losses and power consumption pressures associated with traditional electrical interconnects. Co-packaged optics further bring the optical engine closer to the switch or compute chip, allowing high-bandwidth connections to no longer rely entirely on long-distance electrical signal transmission at the board level. As 800G, 1.6T, and even higher-speed networks enter the data center deployment cycle, the number of optical modules, cabling complexity, energy consumption, and heat dissipation will all impact the expansion efficiency of entire server rooms. The collaboration between Sivers and GF demonstrates that competition in AI data centers has entered a new phase driven by the combined advancement of "compute chips + switch chips + silicon photonics + advanced packaging." Those who can balance bandwidth density, power control, and production stability will have a better chance of entering the core supply chains of major cloud providers and AI infrastructure operators.
This collaboration also continues GF's recent trajectory of strengthening its silicon photonics capabilities. GF previously launched its SCALE co-packaged optics solution and has been providing a manufacturing platform for high-bandwidth, low-power interconnect needs in AI data centers through silicon photonics technology. With the addition of Sivers' laser arrays, the related reference designs and optical engine solutions are expected to gain more complete light source support. Subsequent variables will focus on reference design validation, customer adoption pace, the commercialization speed of co-packaged optics, the cost of the optical module supply chain, and the acceptance of silicon photonics across different data center architectures. If these solutions enter large-scale deployment, optical interconnects will evolve from supporting components in data center networks to becoming core hardware foundations for AI infrastructure expansion.
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