GlobalFoundries, Corning Collaborate to Deliver Detachable Fiber Connector Solutions

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GlobalFoundries announced a collaborative effort with Corning Incorporated to develop detachable fiber connector solutions for GF’s silicon photonics platform. Corning’s GlassBridge™ solution, a glass-waveguide based edge-coupler compatible with the platform’s v-grooves, is designed to meet the growing demands of AI datacenters for high bandwidth and power-efficient optical connectivity. Other coupling mechanisms are also being developed, including a vertically-coupled detachable fiber-to-PIC (Photonic Integrated Circuit) solution—demonstrating GlobalFoundries and Corning’s combined ability to produce multiple forms of co-packaged PIC-to-fiber connectivity.

The collaboration leverages Corning’s world-leading innovation in glass, optical fiber and connectivity technologies. This includes a broad portfolio of special glass compositions, glass wafer, IOX, and laser processing, and Fiber Array Units (FAUs), leveraging fibers with ultra-precise core alignments minimizing insertion loss for the most demanding data center and high-performance computing applications.  

Built on GF’s comprehensive silicon photonics platform that supports co-packaged optics solutions for scale-out and scale-up networks, this collaboration will pair Corning’s well established supply chain and leadership in optical interconnect technologies with GF’s high volume manufacturing capabilities and leadership in silicon photonics.

“Our collaboration with Corning marks a significant step forward in delivering next-generation connectivity solutions for AI and machine learning,” said Kevin Soukup, senior vice president of GF’s silicon photonics product line. “Corning’s cutting-edge fiber technology, integrated with our silicon-proven platform, delivers the performance and flexibility required for enabling scalable, high-density optical packaging for AI datacenters.”

“Our collaboration with GlobalFoundries is helping to shape the future of AI infrastructure and accelerate the progress needed to meet the demands of an increasingly data-driven world,” said Dr. Claudio Mazzali, vice president, global research, Corning. “There’s something truly powerful in combining GlobalFoundries’ and Corning’s expertise in silicon process and optical connectivity—together, we’re enabling new possibilities for the AI-powered industries of tomorrow.”

Demonstrations of the GlassBridge™ edge-coupled glass-waveguide based detachable fiber connector solution will be showcased at the upcoming ECOC Exhibition in Copenhagen, Denmark (in the Corning booth #2118) and GF Technology Summit in Munich, Germany.