Lightmatter CEO on Optical Interconnect: NPO Stays, Lasers Move to 300mm Silicon CMOS
BenBajarin · x · 2026-10-02
The Diligence Stack (Ben Bajarin) published an in-depth interview with Lightmatter founder and CEO Nick Harris on the future of optical interconnect in AI systems.
Key points:
- NPO (near-package optics) may persist even as CPO (co-packaged optics) ramps: NPO avoids an interface that adds power, while CPO offers greater bandwidth density.
- Demand is the easy part of the forecast — accelerators need more bandwidth and copper hits physical limits as link speeds rise and scale-up domains grow. The real constraint is how fast the supply chain can deliver qualified optical engines at repeatable yield.
- Most commercial lasers are still made on small indium phosphide wafers by a small group of suppliers; Harris argues Lightmatter can shift more of that work onto 300mm silicon bases using mature CMOS foundries, opening a different path to laser capacity, while designing around the reliability challenge of thousands of optical links.
Related event: Lightmatter CEO Details Optical Interconnect Roadmap(3 posts)→
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