Standardizing CPO won't matter if the substrate supply chain can't keep up

Lightmatter and other companies proposed a standardized architecture for copackaged optics (CPO) to enable scalable AI clusters, but the success depends critically on the ability of substrate wafer suppliers to meet tight manufacturing tolerances and volume demands. The substrate uniformity in photonics-silicon-on-insulator wafers is significantly more demanding than previous semiconductor substrates, posing a supply chain challenge that standardizing rack-level architecture alone cannot solve.

This Wire brief sits within Fusion42's coverage of Photonics & Optics, AI Infrastructure and Semiconductors.