Optical module trends: A conversation with Finisar
Finisar demonstrated recently a raft of new products that address emerging optical module developments. These include:
- A compact coherent integrated tunable transmitter and receiver assembly
- 400GBASE-FR8 and -LR8 QSFP-DD pluggable modules and a QSFP-DD active optical cable
- A QSFP28 100-gigabit serial FR interface
- 50-gigabit SFP56 SR and LR modules
Rafik Ward, Finisar’s general manager of optical interconnects, explains the technologies and their uses.
Compact coherent
Finisar is sampling a compact integrated assembly that supports 100-gigabit and 200-gigabit coherent transmission.
The integrated tunable transmitter and receiver assembly (ITTRA), to give it its full title, includes the optics and electronics needed for an analogue coherent optics interface.
The 32-gigabaud ITTRA includes a tunable laser, optical amplifier, modulators, modulator drivers, coherent mixers, a photo-detector array and the accompanying trans-impedance amplifiers, all within a gold box. “An entire analogue coherent module in a footprint that is 70 percent smaller than the size of a CFP2 module,” says Ward. The ITTRA's power consumption is below 7.5W.
Rafik WardFinisar says the ITTRA is smaller than the equivalent integrated coherent transmitter-receiver optical sub-assembly (IC-TROSA) design being developed by the Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF).
“We potentially could take this device and enable it to work in that [IC-TROSA] footprint,” says Ward.
Using the ITTRA enables higher-density coherent line cards and frees up space within an optical module for the coherent digital signal processor (DSP) for a CFP2 Digital Coherent Optics (CFP2-DCO) design.
Ward says the CFP2 is a candidate for a 400-gigabit coherent pluggable module along with the QSFP-DD and OSFP form factors. “All have their pros and cons based on such fundamental things as the size of the form factor and power dissipation,” says Ward.
But given coherent DSPs implemented in 7nm CMOS required for 400 gigabit are not yet available, the 100 and 200-gigabit CFP2 remains the module of choice for coherent pluggable interfaces.
The demonstration of the ITTRA implementing a 200-gigabit link using 16-QAM at OFC 2018. Source: Finisar
400 gigabits
Finisar also demonstrated its first 400-gigabit QSFP-DD pluggable module products based on the IEEE standards: the 2km 400GBASE-FR8 and the 10km 400GBASE-LR8. The company also unveiled a QSFP-DD active optical cable to link equipment up to 70m apart.
The two QSFP-DD pluggable modules use eight 50-gigabit PAM-4 electrical signal inputs that are modulated onto eight lasers whose outputs are multiplexed and sent over a single fibre. Finisar chose to implement the IEEE standards as its first QSFP-DD products as they are low-power and lower risk 400-gigabit solutions.
The alternative 2km 400-gigabit design, developed by the 100 Lambda MSA, is the 400G-FR4 that uses four 100-gigabit optical lanes. “This has some risk elements to it such as the [PAM-4] DSP and making 100-gigabit serial lambdas work,” says Ward. “We think the -LR8 and -FR8 are complementary and could enable a fast time-to-market for people looking at these kinds of interfaces.”
The QSFP-DD active optical cable may have a reach of 70m but typical connections are 20m. Finisar uses its VCSEL technology to implement the 400-gigabit interface. At the OFC show in March, Finisar demonstrated the cable working with a Cisco high-density port count 1 rack-unit switch.
I sometimes get asked by customers what is the best way to get to higher-density 100 gigabit. I point to the 400-gigabit DR4.
QSFP28 FR
Finisar also showed it 2km QSFP28 optical module with a single wavelength 100-gigabit PAM-4 output. The QSFP28 FR takes four 25 gigabit-per-second electrical interfaces and passes them through a gearbox chip to form a 50-gigabaud PAM-4 signal that is used to modulate the laser.
The QSFP28 FR is expected to eventually replace the CWDM4 that uses four 25-gigabit wavelengths multiplexed onto a single fibre. “The end-game is to get a 100-gigabit serial module,” says Ward. “This module represents the first generation of that.”
Finisar is also planning a 500m QSFP28 DR. The QSFP28 DR and FR will work with the 500m IEEE 400GBASE-DR4 that has four outputs, each a fibre carrying a 100-gigabit PAM-4 signal, with the -DR4 outputs interfacing with up to four FR or DR modules.
“I sometimes get asked by customers what is the best way to get to higher-density 100 gigabit,” says Ward. “I point to the 400 gigabit DR4, even though we call it a 400-gigabit part, it is also a 4x100-gigabit DR solution.”
Ward says that the 500m reach of the DR is sufficient for the vast majority of links in the data centre.
SFP56 SR and LR
Finisar has also demonstrated two SFP56 modules: a short reach (SR) version that has a reach of 100m over OM4 multi-mode fibre and the 10km LR single-mode interface. The SR is VSCEL-based while the LR uses a directly-modulated distributed feedback laser.
The SFP is deployed widely at speeds up to and including 10 gigabits while the 25-gigabit SFP shipments are starting to ramp. The SFP56 is the next-generation SFP module with a 50-gigabit electrical input and a 50-gigabit PAM-4 optical output.
The SFP56 will be used for several applications, says Finisar. These include linking servers to switches, connecting switches in enterprise applications, and 5G wireless applications.
Finisar says its 50 and 100 gigabit-per-lane products will likely be released throughout 2019, in line with the industry. “The 8-channel devices will likely come out at least a few quarters before the 4-channel devices,” says Ward.
Finisar adds silicon photonics to its technology toolkit
- Finisar revealed its in-house silicon photonics design capability at ECOC
- The company also showed its latest ROADM technologies: a dual wavelength-selective switch and a high-resolution optical channel monitor.
- Also shown was an optical amplifier that spans 400km fibre links
These two complementary technologies [VCSELs and silicon photonics] work well together as we think about the next-generation Ethernet applications.
Rafik Ward
Finisar demonstrated at ECOC its first optical design implemented using silicon photonics. The photonic integrated circuit (PIC) uses a silicon photonics modulator and receiver and was shown operating at 50 Gigabit-per-second.
The light source used with the PIC was a continuous wave distributed feedback (DFB) laser. One Finisar ECOC demonstration showed the eye diagram of the 50 Gig transmitter using non-return-to-zero (NRZ) signalling. Separately, a 40 Gig link using this technology was shown operating error-free over 12km of single mode fibre.
"Finisar, and its fab partner STMicroelectronics, surprised the market with the 50 Gig silicon photonics demonstration,” says Daryl Inniss, practice leader of components at Ovum.
"This, to our knowledge, was the first public demonstration of silicon photonics running at such a high speed," says Rafik Ward, vice president of marketing at Finisar. However, the demonstrations were solely to show the technology's potential. "We are not announcing any new products," he says.
Potential applications for the PIC include the future 50 Gig IEEE Ethernet standard, as well as a possible 40 Gig serial Ethernet standard. "Also next-generation 400 Gig Ethernet and 100 Gig Ethernet using 50 Gig lanes," says Ward. "All these things are being discussed within the IEEE."
Jerry Rawls, co-founder and chairman of Finisar, said in an interview a year ago that the company had not developed any silicon photonics-based products as the technology had not shown any compelling advantage compared to its existing optical technologies.
Now Finisar has decided to reveal its in-house design capability as the technology is at a suitable stage of development to show to the industry. It is also timely, says Ward, given the many topics and applications being discussed in the standards work.
The company sees silicon photonics as part of its technology toolkit available to its engineers as they tackle next-generation module designs.
Finisar unveiled a vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) operating at 40 Gig at the OFC show held in March. The 40 Gig VCSEL demonstration also used NRZ signalling. IBM has also published a technical paper that used Finisar's VCSEL technology operating at 50 Gbps.
"What we are trying to do is come up with solutions where we can enable a common architecture between the short wave and the long wave optical modules," says Ward. "These two complementary technologies [VCSELs and silicon photonics] work well together as we think about the next-generation Ethernet applications."
Cisco Systems, also a silicon photonics proponent, was quoted in the accompanying Finisar ECOC press release as being 'excited' to see Finisar advancing the development of silicon photonics technology. "Cisco is our biggest customer," says Ward. "We see this as a significant endorsement from a very large user of optical modules." Cisco acquired silicon photonics start-up Lightwire for $271 million in March 2012.
ROADM technologies
Finisar also demonstrated two products for reconfigurable optical add/ drop multiplexers (ROADM): a dual configuration wavelength-selective switch (WSS) and an optical channel monitor (OCM).
The dual-configuration WSS is suited to route-and-select ROADM architectures.
Two architectures are used for ROADMs: broadcast-and-select and route-and-select. With broadcast-and-select, incoming channels are routed in the various directions using a passive splitter that in effect makes copies of the incoming signal. To route signals in the outgoing direction, a 1xN WSS is used. However, due to the optical losses of the splitters, such an architecture is used for low node-degree applications. For higher-degree nodes, the optical loss becomes a barrier, such that a WSS is also used for the incoming signals, resulting in the route-and-select architecture. A dual-configuration WSS thus benefits a route-and-select ROADM design.
Finisar's WSS module is sufficiently slim that it occupies a single-chassis slot, unlike existing designs that require two. "It enables system designers to free up slots for other applications such as transponder line cards inside their chassis," says Ward.
The dual WSS modules support flexible grid and come in 2x1x20, 2x1x9 and 2x8x12 configurations. "There are some architectures being discussed for add/ drop that would utilise the WSS in that [2x8x12] configuration," says Ward.
The ECOC demonstrations included different traffic patterns passing through the WSS, as well as attenuation control and the management of super-channels.
Finisar also showed an accompanying high-resolution OCM that also occupies a single-chassis slot. The OCM can resolve the spectral power of channels as narrow as 6.25GHz. The OCM, a single-channel device, can scan a fibre's C-band in 200ms.
A rule of thumb is that an OCM is used for each WSS. A customer often monitors channels on a single fibre, says Ward, and must pick which fibres to monitor. The OCM is typically connected to each fibre or to an optical switch to scan multiple fibres.
"People are looking to use the spectrum in a fibre in a much more optimised way," says Ward. The advent of flexible grid and super-channels requires a much tighter packing of channels. "So, being able to see and identify all of the key elements of these channels and manage them is going to become more and more difficult," he says, with the issue growing in importance as operators move to line speeds greater than 100 Gig.
Finisar also used the ECOC show to demonstrate repeater-less transmission using an amplifier that can span 400km of fibre. Such an amplifier is used in harsh environments where it is difficult to build amplifier huts. The amplifier can also be used for certain submarine applications known as 'festooning' where the cable follows a coastline and returns to land each time amplification is required. Using such a long-span amplifier reduces the overall hops back to the coast.
ECOC 2012 summary - Part 2: Finisar
Gazettabyte completes its summary of key optical announcements at the recent ECOC show held in Amsterdam. In Part 2, Finisar's announcements are detailed.
Part 2
"The general thought with system vendors is that the more they can shrink the in-line equipment into a fewer number of slots, the more slots they have open and available for revenue-generating transceiver and transponder cards"
Rafik Ward, Finisar
Finisar showed its board-mounted parallel optics module in use within a technology demonstrator from data storage firm Xyratex, showcased what it claims is the industry's first two-slot reconfigurable optical add/ drop multiplexer (ROADM) design, unveiled its first CFP2 pluggable transceiver and announced its latest WaveShaper products.
The data storage application uses Finisar's vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL)-based board mounted optical assembly. The optical assembly - or optical engine - comprises 24-channels, 12 transmitters and 12 receivers.
The optical engine sits on the board and is used for such applications as chip-to-chip interconnect, optical backplanes, and dense front panels, and supports a variety of protocols. These include PCI Express, Ethernet and Infiniband as well as proprietary schemes. Indeed the only limit is the VCSEL speed. The optical engine is designed to support traffic up to 28 Gigabit-per-second (Gbps) per channel, once 28 Gigabit VCSELs become available. Finisar have already demonstrated working 28Gbps VCSELs.
The ECOC demonstration showed the optical engine in use within Xyratex's demonstrator storage system. "They are carrying traffic between internal controller cards and the traffic being carried is 12-Gig SAS [serial attached SCSI]," says Rafik Ward, vice president of marketing at Finisar.
As well as the optical engine, the demonstration included polymer waveguides from Vario-optics which connect the optical engine to a backplane connector, built by Huber + Suhner, as well as SAS silicon from LSI.
Finisar first showed the waveguide and connector technologies in a demonstration at OFC 2012. "This is an early prototype but it's a very exciting one," says Ward. "It shows all elements of the ecosystem coming together and running in a live system."
Finisar also showcased what it claims is the industry's first two-slot ROADM line card. The line card was part of a Cisco Systems' platform, according to one analyst shown the demonstration.
The company-designed card uses a high port-count wavelength-selective switch (WSS) that enables both add and drop traffic. "We have built transmit and receive into the same line card using a high port-count device," says Ward. Finisar is not detailing the exact WSS used or how the system is implemented but describes it as a flexible spectrum, 2x1x17 port line card.
The advantage of a denser ROADM line card is that it frees up slots in a system vendor's chassis. A slot can be used for either in-line equipment - WSSes and amplifiers - or terminal equipment that host the transceivers and transponders.
"It is like valuable real-estate," says Ward. "The general thought with system vendors is that the more they can shrink the in-line equipment into a fewer number of slots, the more slots they have open and available for revenue-generating transceiver and transponder cards."
The company also detailed its first CFP2 100 Gigabit optical transceiver. The CFP2 uses a single TOSA comprising four distributed feedback (DFB) lasers, a shared thermo-electric cooler and the multiplexer. The CFP2 consumes under 8W by using the DFBs and an integrated transceiver optical sub-assembly (TOSA).
Rafik Ward Q&A - final part
"Feedback we are getting from customers is that the current 100 Gig LR4 modules are too expensive"
Rafik Ward, Finisar
Q: Broadway Networks, why has Finisar acquired the company?
A: We spent quite some time talking to Broadway and understanding their business. We also talked to Broadway’s customers and the feedback we got on the technical team, the products and what this little start-up was able to accomplish was unanimously very positive.
We think what Broadway has done, for instance their EPON* stick product, is very interesting. With that product, an end user has the ability to make any SFP* port on a low-end Ethernet switch an EPON ONU* interface. This opens up a whole new set of potential customers and end users for EPON.
In reality, consumers will never have Ethernet switches with SFP ports in their house. Where we do see such Ethernet switches are in every major enterprise and many multi-dwelling units. It is an interesting technology that enables enterprises and multi-dwelling units to quickly tool-up for EPON.
* [EPON - Ethernet passive optical network, SFP - small form-factor pluggable optical transceiver, ONU - optical network unit]
Optical transceivers have been getting smaller and faster in the last decade yet laser and photo-detector manufacturing have hardly changed, except in terms of speed. Is this about to change?
Speed is one of the focus areas for the industry and will continue to be. Looking forward in a number of applications, though, we are going to hit the limit for these lasers and we are going to have to look more carefully outside of just raw laser speed to move up the data rate curve.
"We are going to hit the limit for these lasers"
A lot of this work has already started on the line side using different modulation formats and DSP* technology. Over time the question is: What happens on the client side? In future, do we look to other modulation formats on the client side? Eventually we will get there; it may take several years before we need to do things like that. But as an industry we would be foolish to think we won’t have to do this.
WDM* is going to be an increasingly important technology on the client side. We are already seeing this with the 40GBASE-LR4 and 100GBASE-LR4 standards.
* [DSP - digital signal processing, WDM - wavelength-division multiplexing]
Google gave a presentation at ECOC that argued for the need for another 100Gbps interface. What is Finisar’s view?
Feedback we are getting from customers is that the current 100 Gig LR4 modules are too expensive. We have spent a lot of time with customers helping them understand how the current LR4 standard, as is written, actually enables a very low cost optical interface, and the timeframes we believe are very quick in terms of how we can get cost down considerably on 100 Gig. 
Rafik Ward (right) giving Glenn Wellbrock, director of backbone network design at Verizon Business, a tour of Finisar's labsThat was part of the details that [Finisar’s] Chris Cole also presented at ECOC.
There has certainly been a lot of media attention on the two [ECOC] presentations between Finisar and Google. This really is not so much about the quote, ‘drama’, or two companies that have a disagreement which optical interface makes more sense. It is more fundamental than that.
What it comes down to is that, as an industry, we have pretty limited resources. The best thing all of us can do is try to direct these resources – this limited pool we have combined throughout the industry - on a path that makes the most sense to reduce bandwidth cost most significantly.
The best way to do that, and that is already established, is through standards. The [IEEE] standard got it right that the path the industry is on is going to enable the lowest cost 100 Gig [interface]. Like everything, there is some investment required to get us there. The 25 Gig technology now [used as 4x25 Gig] is becoming mainstream and will soon enable the lowest cost solution. My view is that within 18 months to two years this will be a moot point.
If the technology was available 18 months sooner, we wouldn’t even be having this discussion. But that is the position that we, as an industry, are in. With that, it creates some tensions, some turmoil, where customers don’t like to pay more than they perceive they have to.
There is the CFP form factor that is relatively large. Is the point that if current technology was available 18 months ago, 100Gbps could have come out in a QSFP?
The heart of the debate is cost.
There are other elements that always play into a debate like this. Beyond the cost argument, how quickly can two optical interfaces, like a 4x25 Gig versus a 10x10 Gig, each enable a smaller form factor solution.
But I think that is secondary. Had we not had the cost problem that we have now between 4x25 Gig versus 10x10 Gig, I don’t think we would be talking about it.
So it’s the current cost of the 4x25 Gig that is the issue?
Correct.
In September, the ECOC conference and exhibition was held. What were your impressions and did you detect any interesting changes?
There wasn’t so much an overwhelming theme this year at ECOC. In ECOC 2009, it was the year of coherent detection. This year there wasn’t a theme that resonated strongly throughout.
The mood was relatively upbeat. From our perspective, ECOC seemed a little bit smaller in terms of the size of the floor. But all the key people you would expect to be at the show were there.
Maybe the strongest theme – and I wrote about this in my blog – was colourless, directionless, contentionless (CDC) [ROADMs]. I think what I said is that they should have renamed it not ECOC but the ECDC show.
"A blog ... enables a much more informal mechanism to communicate to a broad audience."
Do you read business books and is there one that is useful for your job?
Probably the book I think about the most in my job is Clayton Christensen's The Innovator’s Dilemma.
He talks about how, when you look at very successful technology companies that have failed, what causes them to fail is often new solutions that come from the very low end of the market.
A lot of companies, and he cites examples from the disk drive industry, prided themselves on focussing on the high end of the market but ultimately ended up failing because there was a surprise upstart, someone who came in at the market's low end – in terms of performance, cost etc. – that continued to innovate using their low-end architecture, making it suitable for the core market.
For these large, well-established companies, once they realised they had this competitor, it was too late.
I think about that business book probably more than others. It’s a very interesting take on technology and the threat that can be posed to people in high-tech companies.
Your job sounds intensive and demanding. What do you do outside work to relax?
I’m a big [ice] hockey fan. I’ve been a hockey fan for many years; it’s a pretty intense sport. These days I tend to watch more hockey than I play but I very much enjoy the sport.
The other thing I started up this year that I had never done before – a little side project – was vegetable gardening. Surprisingly, it ended up taking a lot of my attention and I think it was a good distraction for me.
It can be quite remarkable, when you have your own little vegetable garden, how often you go and look at its progress. I’d find often coming home from work, first thing I’d want to do is go see how things were progressing in my vegetable garden.
You are the face of Finisar’s blog. What have you learnt from the experience?
A blog is an interesting tool to get information out to a broad audience. For companies like Finisar, it serves as a very important communication vehicle that didn’t exist previously.
In the old days, if you wanted to get information out to a broad group of customers, you either had to meet and communicate that information face-to-face, or via email; very targeted, one customer-at-a-time communication.
Another way was the press release. A press release was a very easy way to broadcast that information. But the challenge is that not all information that you want to broadcast is suitable for a press release.
The reason why I really like the blog is that it enables a much more informal mechanism to communicate to a broad audience.
Has it helped your job in any tangible way?
We found some interesting customer opportunities. These have come in through the blog when we’ve talked about specific products. That hasn’t happened extremely frequently but we have had a few instances. So it’s probably the most tangible thing: we can point to enhanced business because of it.
But the strength of something like a blog goes much deeper than that, in terms of the communication vehicle it enables.
You have about a year’s experience running a blog. If an optical component company is thinking about starting a blog, what is your advice?
The best advice I can give to anybody looking to do a blog is that it is something you have to commit to up-front.
A blog where you don’t continue to refresh the content regularly becomes a tired blog very quickly. We have made a conscious effort to have updated postings as best we can, on a weekly basis or even more frequently. There are certainly periods where we have gone longer than that but if you look back, in general, we have a wide variety of content that has been refreshed regularly.
I have to give credit to others - guest bloggers - within the organisation that help to maintain the content. This is critical. I would struggle to keep up with the pace if it was just myself every week.
Click here for the first part of Rafik Ward's Q&A.
Q&A with Rafik Ward - Part 1
"This is probably the strongest growth we have seen since the last bubble of 1999-2000." Rafik Ward, Finisar
Q: How would you summarise the current state of the industry?
A: It’s a pretty fun time to be in the optical component business, and it’s some time since we last said that.
We are at an interesting inflexion point. In the past few years there has been a lot of emphasis on the migration from 1 to 2.5 Gig to 10 Gig. The [pluggable module] form factors for these speeds have been known, and involved executing on SFP, SFP+ and XFPs.
But in the last year there has been a significant breakthrough; now a lot of the discussion with customers are around 40 and 100 Gig, around form factors like QSFP and CFP - new form factors we haven’t discussed before, around new ways to handle data traffic at these data rates, and new schemes like coherent modulation.
It’s a very exciting time. Every new jump is challenging but this jump is particularly challenging in terms of what it takes to develop some of these modules.
From a business perspective, certainly at Finisar, this is probably the strongest growth we have seen since the last bubble of 1999-2000. It’s not equal to what it was then and I don’t think any of us believes it will be. But certainly the last five quarters has been the strongest growth we’ve seen in a decade.
What is this growth due to?
There are several factors.
There was a significant reduction in spending at the end of 2008 and part of 2009 where end users did not keep up with their networking demands. Due to the global financial crisis, they [service providers] significantly cut capex so some catch-up has been occurring. Keep in mind that during the global financial crisis, based on every metric we’ve seen, the rate of bandwidth growth has been unfazed.
From a Finisar perspective, we are well positioned in several markets. The WSS [wavelength-selective switch] ROADM market has been growing at a steady clip while other markets are growing quite significantly – at 10 Gig, 40 Gig and even now 100 Gig. The last point is that, based on all the metrics we’ve seen, we are picking up market share.
Your job title is very clear but can you explain what you do?
I love my job because no two days are the same. I come in and have certain things I expect to happen and get done yet it rarely shapes out how I envisaged it.
There are really three elements to my job. Product management is the significant majority of where I focus my efforts. It’s a broad role – we are very focussed on the products and on the core business to win market share. There is a pretty heavy execution focus in product management but there is also a strategic element as well.
The second element of my job is what we call strategic marketing. We spend time understanding new, potential markets where we as Finisar can use our core competencies, and a lot of the things we’ve built, to go after. This is not in line with existing markets but adjacent ones: Are there opportunities for optical transceivers in things like military and consumer applications?
One of the things I’m convinced of is that, as the price of optical components continues to come down, new markets will emerge. Some of those markets we may not even know today, and that is what we are finding. That’s a pretty interesting part of my job but candidly I spend quite a bit less time on it [strategic marketing] than product management.
The third area is corporate communications: talking to media and analysts, press releases, the website and blog, and trade shows.
"40Gbps DPSK and DQPSK compete with each other, while for 40 Gig coherent its biggest competitor isn’t DPSK and DQPSK but 100 Gig."
Some questions on markets and technology developments.
Is it becoming clearer how the various 40Gbps line side optics – DPSK, DQPSK and coherent – are going to play out?
The situation is becoming clearer but that doesn’t mean it is easier to explain.
The market is composed of customers and end users that will use all of the above modulation formats. When we talk to customers, every one has picked one, two or sometimes all three modulation formats. It is very hard to point to any trend in terms of picks, it is more on a case-by-case basis. Customers are, like us at the component level, very passionate about the modulation format that they have chosen and will have a variety of very good reasons why a particular modulation format makes sense.
Unlike certain markets where you see a level of convergence, I don’t think that there will be true convergence at 40 Gbps. Coherent – DP-QPSK - is a very powerful technology but the biggest challenge 40 Gig has with DP-QPSK is that you have the same modulation format at 100 Gig.
The more I look at the market, 40Gbps DPSK and DQPSK compete with each other, while for 40 Gig coherent its biggest competitor isn’t DPSK and DQPSK but 100 Gig.
Finisar has been quiet about its 100 Gig line side plans, what is its position?
We view these markets - 40 and 100 Gig line side – as potentially very large markets at the optical component level. Despite that fact that there are some customers that are doing vertical integrated solutions, we still see these markets as large ones. It would be foolish for us not to look at these markets very carefully. That is probably all I would say on the topic right now.
"Photonic integration is important and it becomes even more important as data rates increase."
Finisar has come out with an ‘optical engine’, a [240Gbps] parallel optics product. Why now?
This is a very exciting part of our business. We’ve been looking for some time at the future challenges we expect to see in networking equipment. If you look at fibre optics today, they are used on the front panel of equipment. Typically it is pluggable optics, sometimes it is fixed, but the intent is that the optics is the interface that brings data into and out of a chassis.
People have been using parallel optics within chassis – for backplane and other applications – but it has been niche. The reason it’s niche is that the need hasn’t been compelling for intra-chassis applications. We believe that need will change in the next decade. Parallel optics intra-chassis will be needed just to be able to drive the amount of bandwidth required from one printed circuit board to another or even from one chip to another.
The applications driving this right now are the very largest supercomputers and the very largest core routers. So it is a market focussed on the extreme high-end but what is the extreme high-end today will be mainstream a few years from now. You will see these things in mainstream servers, routers and switches etc.
Photonic integration – what’s happening here?
Photonic integration is something that the industry has been working on for several years in different forms; it continues to chug on in the background but that is not to understate its importance.
For vendors like Finisar, photonic integration is important and it becomes even more important as data rates increase. What we are seeing is that a lot of emerging standards are based around multiple lasers within a module. Examples are the 40GBASE-LR4 and the 100GBASE-LR4 (10km reach) standards, where you need four lasers and four photo-detectors and the corresponding mux-demux optics to make that work.
The higher the number of lasers required inside a given module, and the more complexity you see, the more room you have to cost-reduce with photonic integration.