Dr Sanjai Parthasarathi, chief marketing officer at Coherent Corp, took time out on day three of OFC 2026 to speak with Fibre Systems about the company's innovations across five technology categories and the packed crowds.
Coherent showcased breakthrough innovations spanning next-generation pluggable transceivers, co-packaged optics, optical circuit switching, thermal management technologies and multi-rail scale-across platforms at the Los Angeles Convention Center from 17 to 19 March.
"We're super excited and customers are super excited, which is even more exciting for us," Parthiban told Fibre Systems. "It's hard to imagine this is day three in the afternoon. Usually this is when people start walking towards the exit."
CPO demonstrations draw sustained attention
Parthiban discussed Coherent's CPO demonstration area, which attracted crowds throughout the three-day event, and the company's approach to showcasing multiple technology platforms.
"CPO is where a lot of the activity is happening now. It's scale-out today, but most of the excitement is in scale-up," Parthiban explained.
The interview covers Coherent's demonstrations of three distinct CPO technology platforms, the company's multi-rail amplification breakthrough enabling four times the capacity in the same volumetric footprint, and innovations in thermal management solutions addressing heat generation limiting data centre growth.
Industry-first 400G per lane breakthrough
Parthiban reveals details about what Coherent describes as an industry first: the first demonstration of 400 Gbit/s per lane based on silicon photonics chips, alongside innovations in 1.6 Tbit/s transceivers across multiple DSP suppliers and the new XPO pluggable MSA form factor targeting 12.8 Tbit/s architectures.
The wide-ranging discussion explores Coherent's vertical integration strategy, materials science expertise spanning thermal management solutions, and the company's vision for supporting AI-driven infrastructure growth.
"At the heart of Coherent, we are a materials company," Parthiban said during the interview, discussing innovations from liquid-cooled plates to thermoelectric generators that recover electrical power from waste heat.
Parthiban also shares insights on industry leadership at OFC 2026, with Coherent executives playing prominent roles across the conference's most influential stages, and the company's approach to increasing R&D spending to meet customer expectations for year-on-year cutting-edge innovation.
