SoftBank Collaborates with NewPhotonics to Develop Advanced Photonics Technology for AI-RAN
The Significance
SoftBank Corp. and NewPhotonics, a leader in advanced integrated photonics, announced today a joint research and development collaboration. Its purpose is to advance photon technologies such as LPO (linearly-driven pluggable optics), CPO (co encapsulated optics) and all-optical switching structures. This optoelectronic fusion technology combines high-speed optical communication and optical switching technology. What’s more, it can achieve low latency and low power consumption in AI data centers and mobile front-end infrastructure. These technologies support SoftBank in utilizing NewPhotonics’ patented technology and photonic integrated chips (PIC) in AI data centers and mobile fronthaul infrastructure. And it is also possible to achieve reliable all-optical communication and optical structure switching.
This technology aims to improve the performance of GPU/CPU/switch architecture through PIC and low latency optical connections. In addition, it will also address the power consumption and capacity bottlenecks of AI cluster workloads based on high-speed optical communication and optical switching technologies. The patented NewPhotonics optical SerDes (sequencer/deserializer) will enable higher density and low latency data transmission in mobile fronthaul and data centers.
The advanced optical technology of co packaging has improved the speed and energy efficiency of data center redesign. And it is crucial for high-performance computing and vector processing applications. In addition, the LPO technology integrates NewPhotonics PIC into optical transceivers. So it can achieve transmission over longer distances than existing LPO technologies. Moreover, applying NewPhotonics’ LPO technology to mobile fronthaul is expected to reduce processing latency, lower power consumption, and extend the distance of data transmission devices.
The Expectation
Ryuji Wakikawa, Director of SoftBank’s Advanced Technology Research Institute, said, “We believe that our collaboration with NewPhotonics is necessary for the next generation of infrastructure. Through this collaboration, we envision using optoelectronic fusion technology to transform AI data centers and mobile fronthaul infrastructure, improving speed, distance constraints, capacity, and most importantly, bringing sustainable benefits, providing SoftBank with significant advantages and market leadership.”
NewPhotonics CEO Yaniv Ben Haim added, “Our new partnership agreement with SoftBank marks an important milestone for our company and the entire industry in advancing CPO and pluggable optical interconnect technologies that meet the needs of modern computing and AI infrastructure. We remain committed to breaking the limitations of optical communication with lower latency and power over scalable distances. This collaboration demonstrates our confidence in the impact of all-optical connectivity in the future development of AI and 6G, thanks to our patented photonics technology innovation.”