Recently, driven by AI arithmetic, NVIDIA has set off another wave of CPO. For this one about the future fate of the majority of domestic optical module manufacturers of technological change, fiber optic online industry consultant, the domestic photonic chip technology advocate - Bill Zhou, talked about his views on the internal logic of the CPO for the industry and related investors reference.
1. Impact of CPO on Optical Module Manufacturers
According to the definition of IEEE, CPO (Co-Packaged Optics) refers to the optical transceiver chipset and electrical switching chip co-packaged in the same material substrate technology. Compared with optical modules, CPO eliminates the two-level packaging form of OSA (Optical Sub-Assembly) and module, and thus inevitably improves the performance of optical interconnection and switching systems, while significantly reducing cost, size, and thermal power consumption. Therefore, CPO to replace the optical module is the general trend, the problem is only the rhythm of market penetration and time.
CPO market penetration rhythm depends on both commercial and technical factors. Before IBM, Intel, Broadcom, Cisco launched CPO is still mainly oriented to the data center application scenarios, and now NVIDIA TSMC launched CPO is to directly hit the optical interconnection of AI arithmetic pain points. Therefore, NVIDIA's entry will greatly accelerate the commercialization of CPO in AI.
In addition, the technical factors that are likely to drive the development of CPO come from 3.2 Tbps. for the mainstream application of single-wave 200G 500m, the modulator material type has become a technical focus. Silicon-based performance was difficult to meet, and indium phosphide drove up costs due to low yields, so thin-film lithium niobate (TFLN) became the preferred choice. However, in order to take full advantage of the performance advantages, TFLN chips are more suitable for non-bending folded straight waveguide design, which means that the current QSFP series package size becomes an obstacle, therefore, the use of CPO will have more flexible design space.
The replacement of optical modules by CPOs will be gradual. In this process, due to economies of scale, the domestic first will be affected by the head of the optical module manufacturers should be.
2. CPO and heterogeneous integration, monolithic integration
In the semiconductor industry, in general, the wafer-level functionality is called integration, and between the chip (group) is called packaging. CPO is a packaging technology, while the mono or heterogeneous integration refers to the functionality of the optical transceiver components in the same wafer or multiple wafers to achieve the merger.
Comparing in terms of technical difficulty, CPO is easier and earlier to commercialize than heterogeneous or monolithic integration. Therefore, CPO will utilize the market advantage of first-mover time to hinder the development of these two integration technologies.
3. CPO = China Photonics Opportunity?
From the above analysis, it can be seen that the current CPO technology dominated by U.S. companies is indeed a considerable threat to China's photonics chip strategy. On the one hand, CPO will soon make China's many optical module manufacturers to lose market advantage, so that the high-end manufacturing center of the photonics industry back to the United States. On the other hand, CPO will make the domestic investment in heavy investment, would like to bend the road to overtake the heterogeneous or monolithic integration technology results will be seriously slowed down, and even in the market to lose the window of time.
Is it possible to find a technical solution to get rid of the imminent “necklace” of CPO? What is Dr. Zhou's answer? If you are interested in this, please contact Fiber Optics Online.
Dr. Bill Zhou was the first in China to propose SSIP (Silicon Substrate Interposer Photonics, Silicon Substrate Interposer Photonics) integration technology. It is a more integrated than CPO, wafer-level optoelectronic components integration platform, not only the performance can be comparable to CPO, but also, the cost, process maturity is more than CPO a chip.
