Silicon photonics specialist Luxtera has shipped over a million Silicon Photonic Parallel Single Mode 4-lane (PSM4) optical transceiver products.

To celebrate this achievement, Luxtera’s VP of Engineering Peter De Dobbelaere will be presenting on data center photonics at the European Conference on Optical Communications (ECOC) in Düsseldorf, Germany later this week.

The optical super cycle

“This is a huge milestone for the optics industry and an exciting achievement for Luxtera,” Greg Young, president and CEO of Luxtera, said.

“With over 1 million units deployed, sweeping design wins, and 100Gbps PSM4 shipping in 100K+ volumes, it is clear that our products are at the center of the industry’s $5 billion optical super cycle. Passing this milestone signals that our customers have embraced our vision, including volume orders for solutions that offer long reach and low cost with best in class performance.”

Luxtera was a founding member and drafter of the 100G-PSM4 Multi Supplier Agreement (MSA) in 2014, and has been helping shape the IEEE 802.3bs, 200GBase-DR4 and 400GBase-DR4 specifications.

The Luxtera 100G PSM4 optical transceiver includes four independently operating transmitter and receiver channels that intergrate high-speed phase modulators, photodetectors, waveguides, grating couplers, high-speed electrical retimers, and integrated control circuitry, powered by one laser.

Last year, the company said that the use of a single laser offers a cost advantage over competing 100G PSM4 products that require four lasers.

However, the product will likely see competition from Intel, which has been shipping 100G optical transceivers since June. Intel says its implementation of silicon photonics uses a cheap hybrid indium phosphide/silicon laser.

During the official announcement at the Intel Developer Forum last month, Microsoft was on stage and suggested that they might use Intel’s technology.