Marvell and GlobalFoundries: A Perfect Partnership in Wafer Excellence
This year, Nvidia’s CEO Jensen Huang made a keen prediction that Marvell’s optical technology would position it as the next trillion-dollar enterprise. On Thursday, Marvell took a significant stride towards that vision by revealing its collaboration with GlobalFoundries, an American wafer fabrication company renowned for its silicon photonics innovations. This alliance is focused on boosting silicon germanium (SiGe) wafer production at the Burlington, Vermont facility of the fab.
Silicon Germanium: What’s the Buzz?
SiGe is essential for crafting optical transceivers that translate electrical signals into optical signals and back. They also play a role in laser modules present in many high-end switches from companies like Nvidia. GlobalFoundries believes that their additional capacity will facilitate the manufacturing of near- and co-packaged optics (CPO/NPO) and “next-gen” pluggable optics. Nvidia is already leveraging co-packaged optics to enhance power efficiency and reliability in some of its Spectrum Ethernet and Quantum InfiniBand switches. Analysts anticipate that NPO will emerge in large, multi-rack systems such as Huawei’s new Ascend 960DT-based SuperPods. There’s a consensus that Nvidia’s upcoming multi-rack systems will adopt NPO as well.
SiGe Technology: Accelerating Performance
The fab asserts that its SiGe technology has been validated for speeds up to 200 Gbps per lane, essential for 1.6 Tbps transceivers. Faster lane speeds could pave the way for the development of 3.2 Tbps transceivers currently in the design phase. The appetite for optics solutions has surged, largely driven by AI.
The Surge of Optics: Insights from Computex
While speaking at Computex this spring, Marvell’s CEO Matt Murphy discussed the impending spike in optics demand. Historically, optics have primarily been utilized to link racks to resources within the datacenter, while shorter distances were managed by more affordable, less energy-consuming copper interconnects. However, as lane speeds escalated from 25 Gbps to 50, 100, and then 200 Gbps, copper interconnects began to challenge their limits regarding reach.
Copper: The Final Frontier
400 Gbps per lane is essentially the threshold for copper, even within a single rack; beyond that, copper cables struggle to transmit signals at speed beyond 1.25 meters. Consequently, the entire ecosystem has been heavily investing to enhance optics and photonics supply chains. GlobalFoundries isn’t the only company increasing production; Nvidia, in particular, has invested billions in optics technology firms, including $2 billion each into Lumentum and Coherent.
Coherent’s Major Developments
A few months later, Coherent revealed intentions to increase production of indium phosphide wafers used in lasers, photodetectors, and modulators at its Sherman, Texas fabrication plant by four times.
Conclusion: Wafers at the Ready!
It appears that Marvell and GlobalFoundries are placing their bets, seeking to make a significant impact in the optics sector. If they execute their strategy effectively, they may well ride the wave of AI to triumph.
