Components and Subsystems

II‐VI has announced an uncooled 980nm pump laser module in a compact 3-pin micro-format package designed to meet the stringent reliability and power-efficiency requirements of ultra-compact amplification in current and next-generation high-bit-rate optical transceivers. 

Effect Photonics has announced a new, full-band tunable optical system-on-chip designed to meet the requirements of the expanding data centre interconnect (DCI) market.

Last year the company introduced a 100G transceiver capable of 80km reach using direct-detect technology (Going without gold: Effect Photonics unveils first products). This year it’s branching out into building blocks for coherent optical modules.

Chip maker Microsemi has announced a new mobile fronthaul product, based on its DIGI-G4 family of Optical Transport Network (OTN) processors, that will enable high-capacity mobile fronthaul connectivity for converged 4G and 5G centralised radio access networks (C-RANs).

Fibre-optic cable and accessories manufacturer AFL is introducing two new products at OFC 2017 in Los Angeles this week: its range of optical card edge and on-card assemblies, and Wrapping Tube Cable with SpiderWeb Ribbon (SWR) technology.

Communications chip developer GigPeak has announced the GX66471, a 64Gbaud quad-channel linear optical modulator driver for next-generation 400G/600G coherent applications.

The 64Gbaud linear driver offers a way for line card and pluggable module vendors to bring next-generation 400G and 600G coherent optical modules to the market.

TeraXion will show a compact tunable dispersion compensator that manages chromatic dispersion simultaneously across the entire C-band at OFC 2017 in Los Angeles on 21–23 March.

The ClearSpectrum TDCMX-SM has been designed to provide significant cost and space savings in 100G interconnects based on direct-detect technology such as PAM4 and DMT. Unlike coherent modules, which compensate for optical dispersion within the digital signal processor, direct-detect optics require separate optical dispersion compensation in the line system.

II‐VI has developed a miniature tunable optical filter designed for high-speed, high-density optical transceivers. Using a tunable optical filter to remove noise from a transmitter improves the signal fidelity and increases transmission reach, which will be essential to the performance of high-speed advanced complex modulation formats such as such as 64QAM with Nyquist filtering.

NeoPhotonics will demonstrate its new 64Gbaud, polarisation-multiplexed, quadrature micro-modulator (Micro-MOD) at the OFC 2017 Exhibition in Los Angeles, on 21–23 March.

The micro-modulator represents a significant step in enabling small form factor capability for next-generation high-speed optical links. When coupled with a high-bandwidth Micro-ICR and ultra-narrow linewidth tunable laser, the Micro-MOD will enable 400G and 600G coherent transceiver modules and line card applications that require small size, high bandwidth and low power dissipation.

Finisar says its BPDV4121100GHz balanced detector operates at frequencies in excess of 100GHz to enable coherent signal detection and characterisation at rates up to 160Gbaud, making it the fastest detector on the market. This component will enable the next generation of optical test and measurement equipment, to help vendors develop even higher baud rate optical transmission systems, the company explains.

NeoPhotonics has begun sampling a Twin 8x16 multicast switch (MCS) module with an integrated amplifier array for use in high performance colourless-directionless-contentionless (CDC) networks.

The 8x16 MCS can drop channels from any of eight different directions through any of 16 different ports without contention, even if identical wavelengths coming from different directions are dropped at the same time. An optional 17th port is available for network monitoring and control. The MCS modules also have a “twin” circuit to perform the equivalent add functions.