GigOptix Delivers Electro-Optical Polymer for On-Chip Optical Interconnects

GigOptix, Inc. reportedly announced the supply of its Electro-Optical polymer material to semiconductor and computer manufacturers to serve as first engagements enabling the migration from electrical to optical on-chip interconnects for use in high speed CMOS circuits.

 

The International Roadmap for Semiconductors has identified interconnects made with metal on the top layer as a major problem when considering further increase in chip clock speeds. High clock speeds are required in cases where data has to be moved between the on-chip CPU cores and the internal cache memories at very fast rates.

 

Also in new generation computers, networking equipment and consumer electronics equipment faster chips are required owing to which most semiconductor and computer companies have moved towards on-chip nano-photonic interconnects, GigOptix sources said.

 

On-chip optical interconnects feature THz bandwidth with low cross talk making GigOptix’ EO polymer a suitable optical material for on-chip interconnects. It facilitates the designing and fabrication of fully monolithic I/O on die with the microprocessor and memory in a CMOS process.

 

Company sources confirmed that GigOptix’ EO polymer material has a low dielectric constant which allows large bandwidth modulation and a high electro-optical coefficient making it most suitable for CMOS circuitry.

vice president of marketing at GigOptix said in a statement. “We are not only working with partners under government funded research programs but also with major commercial companies who see the unique benefits of our polymer properties for use in on-chip interconnects. We are selling the polymer now to support the development of new capabilities and we are considering a number of potential business models to make it more widely available as the advanced products move closer towards production.”

 

GigOptix electro-optic polymer product is available in both material form and as processed wafers which can be customized later depending on the customer application, the company said.

 

The company also specializes in high speed electronic devices like polymer-optic modulators, modulator drivers, laser drivers and TIAs for telecom, datacom, Infiniband and consumer optical systems. These are used in serial and parallel communication technologies from 1G and 120G.