DR. SURESH VENKATESAN, POET Tech Chairman and CEO
Look for the momentum for artificial intelligence hardware applications to continue to accelerate in 2025. For more than two decades, innovation in software has dominated the tech industry but there is now a revolution happening in hardware that is driven by the demand from AI developers for more data speed and lower power consumption.
The energy requirements of AI compute networking is more intensive than anything we’ve ever seen in the world. Existing AI programs must execute trillions of computations to perform to their capability. But the monetary cost of delivering that kind of performance and the environmental cost, too, is a significant hindrance for traditional semiconductor processes.
The optical interposer, which POET pioneered, is gaining traction as a platform technology that can meet the high-volume production requirements of AI clusters while reducing cost and power consumption. Several large companies, including Nvidia, have publicly stated that optical interposers are likely essential for future applications. Such endorsements have resulted in exploding interest for optical interposer-based photonics solutions from several large transceiver companies. The global optical transceiver market for 800Gbps and 1.6Tbps is projected to grow at a CAGR of 33%, rising from $2.5 billion in 2024 to $10.5 billion by 2029, according to a Lightcounting forecast.
As Foxconn Interconnect Technology and Luxshare Tech, two of POET’s customers, point out, the optical interposer features an architecture that addresses industry pain points. The wafer-scale passive assembly of our optical engines includes connecting electronic and photonics components through the use of built-in high-speed metal traces and optical waveguides on the interposer. That wafer-scale passive-assembly process eliminates wire bonds, the requirement for lenses and isolators, and simplifies the system design.
It’s part of a “semiconductorization of photonics” approach that can propel the next generation of computing devices. As we enter the new year, the market is already leveling up with more 800Gbps and 1.6Tbps applications. In the future, 3.2Tbps optical engines will be in demand. Finding a platform technology that can seamlessly support and guide that growth to higher speeds without necessitating the retrofitting of existing architecture or costly capital expenditures is among the solutions the industry is seeking. Expect to see the emergence of new applications because of the urgent need for innovation in these most innovative of times.
Click here to read the 2025 Executive Viewpoints in Semiconductor Digest
