OnTopic: AI data center providers seek power and bandwidth promise in co-packaged optics

Co-packaged optics (CPO), a high-speed networking technology that integrates optical components (lasers, photodetectors) directly with switch/compute chips (ASICs) in the same package, continues to show promise. Advocates of CPO maintain that it reduces power consumption by over 80% and increases bandwidth density by shortening electrical traces to millimeters. Used primarily in data centers and AI/ML, CPO enables faster, more efficient data transfer with the necessary speed and efficiency for “scale-up” (within servers/racks) and “scale-out” (between racks) networks. Despite CPO’s promise, the technology is still in its early stages.

A recent Lightwave survey revealed that while CPO (17%) and next-generation pluggable optics beyond ZR/ZR+ (14%) are drawing interest, adoption appears cautious. In this new eBook, we’ll examine CPO’s potential to scale AI clusters and racks beyond what copper can support, adoption realities, and how new double-sided wafer probe test solutions can address CPO validation that traditional methods can’t meet.

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