INDUSTRY

Luxtera today announced it has been awarded the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Electronic and Photonic Integrated Circuits (EPIC) Phase II contract based on successful completion of Phase 1 of the project -- which resulted in the world’s first 40Gbps DWDM single CMOS chip transceiver. Phase II of the project will culminate in an even more highly integrated 40Gbps transceiver offering improved performance, smaller size and lower power than demonstrated in Phase I – bringing key additional circuitry onto the single monolithic CMOS chip. The transceiver will also be designed so that it can seamlessly scale to a 100Gbps transceiver, which is the focus of the future, Phase III effort. In the first phase of the DARPA EPIC contract, Luxtera met the technical objectives set by DARPA by developing technology to multiplex four 10Gbps wavelengths onto a single fiber, on a production CMOS die – resulting in a single fiber all CMOS 40Gbps link. In cooperation with Sun Microsystems, Luxtera will be demonstrating this EPIC Phase 1 device at Sun Microsystems’ booth during this year’s Supercomputing Conference, SC ‘06, being held in Tampa, Florida, November 13th – 16th. Last year at SC ‘05 Luxtera and Sun Microsystems demonstrated a 40Gbps DWDM system comprised of a number of CMOS chips; this year’s demonstration illustrates a vastly increased level of integration. “We are very pleased with the successful outcome of Phase I, and we’re currently on track to meet DARPA’s objectives for a successful Phase II,” said Cary Gunn, co-founder and CTO of Luxtera. “We already have our eyes on Phase III and are confident we can deliver a 100Gbps transceiver within the scope of this program.” “This new phase of the EPIC program follows several years of productive collaboration. It further validates the approaches being explored by Sun and Luxtera. Luxtera’s silicon photonics technologies show great potential for break-away high performance computing applications, and we look forward to our continued involvement in this important program,” says Mike Vildibill, Director of Advanced Programs at Sun. Luxtera’s breakthrough CMOS Photonics technology integrates high-performance photonics and mainstream electronics on a single die, which along with integrated lasers brings fiber connectivity directly to the chip. Luxtera is currently sampling prototypes to development partners and the company will launch a commercial transceiver product line based on this underlying technology in 2007 – years ahead of the competition. Future applications will extend to chip-to-chip and intra-chip optical connectivity.