Teem Photonics releases new erbium doped waveguide amplifier array

Aug. 7, 2001

Aug. 7, 2001--Teem Photonics has released a new version of the EDWA Array, four erbium doped waveguide amplifiers integrated into one tiny package.

Teem Photonics has released a new version of the EDWA Array, four erbium doped waveguide amplifiers integrated into one tiny package, just 135x22x17mm3. Teem Photonics' move from one to four integrated amplifiers per substrate demonstrates the scalability and volume production advantages of its integrated optics. The company will introduce eight- and 16-way versions in the future.

The EDWA (erbium-doped waveguide amplifier) arrays address the problems system manufacturers face as they develop the next generation of optical transport systems. Increasing optical complexity leads to increased component losses, but erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (EDFAs) are too bulky to meet the equipment space constraints that carriers demand. Teem Photonics' EDWA arrays have an extremely small footprint and can easily address the loss issues in large photonic crossconnects and other optical switch fabrics.

"Cooking for four is not much more complicated than cooking for one, and it's the same when we bake our amplifier substrates," said Teem Photonics CEO Antoine Kevorkian. "All that is needed to make a complete amplifier module is the addition of pump lasers and a small number of other external components, but these are stages suitable for volume production, and nothing compared to the difficulties facing EDFA and micro-optics vendors when they want to scale their products."

Any application that requires boosting the power level on several channels on separate fibers or multiple wavelength channels on several fibers in a tight space will benefit from the EDWA array. Gains of up to 15 dB are possible, and individual pump power control allows for load balancing. In addition, Teem Photonics' EDWAs have the low polarization dependence and noise of conventional EDFAs, but in a fraction of the space.

Teem Photonics' manufacturing process integrates most of the amplifier functions onto a planar chip, vastly reducing the number of active alignments and splices to increase both the intrinsic reliability and reduce the production cost of these devices.

About Teem Photonics:

Teem Photonics develops and manufactures innovative active and passive optical components for DWDM fiber network applications. For more information, visit www.teemphotonics.com.