STMicro chooses PSM4 for first silicon photonics product

STMicroelectronics has revealed that its first silicon photonics product will be the 100 Gigabit PSM4. The 500m-reach PSM4 multi-source agreement (MSA) is a single-mode design that uses four parallel fibres in each direction. The chip company expects the PSM4 optical engine to be in production during 2015. 

"We have prototypes and can show them running very well at 40 Gig [4x10 Gig]," says Flavio Benetti, group vice president, digital product group and general manager, networking products division at STMicroelectronics. "But it is expected to be proven at 4x25 Gig in the next few months." STMicroelectronics has just received its latest prototype chip that is now working at 4x25 Gig. 

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Silicon photonics: Q&A with Kotura's CTO

A Q&A with Mehdi Asghari, CTO of silicon photonics start-up, Kotura.  In part one, Asghari talks about a recent IEEE conference that included silicon photonics, the next Ethernet standard, and the merits of silicon photonics for system design.

Part 1

 

"Photons and electrons are like cats and dogs. Electrons are dogs: they behave, they stick by you, they are loyal, they do exactly as you tell them, whereas cats are their own animals and they do what they like. And that is what photons are like."

Mehdi Asghari, CTO of Kotura

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