Lightmatter Showcases Open Rack Switch and XPU Server Advancements

Lightmatter showcased new advancements in photonic computing for data centers at the Open Compute Project (OCP) Global Summit in San Jose. The company presented its Passage-based CPO switch tray and an XPU tray, both engineered to comply with OCP's open standards. A key highlight was the CPO switch tray, developed in collaboration with Flex, which integrates Lightmatter's Passage CPO technology and Guide DR laser modules.

These systems represent the first open solutions based on Open Rack Version 3 (ORv3) and Modular Hardware System (MHS) specifications, incorporating Lightmatter's Passage CPO optics, Guide DR laser modules, and vClick connectors. The switch tray, capable of 204.8 Tbps, was developed with Flex as a production validation platform. Additionally, a 102.4 Tbps XPU tray was demonstrated, utilizing DC-MHS infrastructure from another partner and optical interfaces from Corning.

These new solutions enable significantly denser and more efficient data transfer within data centers compared to traditional copper interconnects. Lightmatter states that the solutions offer 2-4 times greater rack faceplate density efficiency than conventional laser modules. The company emphasizes that open optical interconnects are crucial for scaling compute capacity in AI infrastructure.

Lightmatter is part of the Open Silicon Photonics for AI Systems initiative, a collaboration involving over 20 companies aiming to advance open standardization in silicon photonics for AI systems. The company believes that a unified open architecture will accelerate the adoption of photonic technology in data centers.