Boston Chapter of the IEEE Photonics Society

Abstract:  As system photonic interconnection migrates from the network to the package, the number of photonic components increases and the contribution of photonics to system cost become significant. Learning Curve analyses have shown that manufacturing cost reduction is directly related to the number of units produced. If a common manufacturing platform is shared across the industry, one can expect that cost reduction will scale with manufacturing volume. Integrated Silicon Microphotonics is today the only platform capable of high volume production (>10 million units) and high levels of integration. Commercial applications in Active Optical Cables and high spectral efficiency communication are ramping to production levels beyond previous history.

Criteria for a High Volume Manufacturing: To construct the needed Learning Curve, Research, Development and Manufacturing must address a common platform that applies across multiple applications. The platform must be capable of continuous scaling of performance through higher levels of integration, and it must be capable of maximizing i) product throughput, ii) resource utilization and iii) production yield with low cost inspection and test. Common design tools must be capable of serving diverse applications with successive generations of increasing performance. The packaging and interconnection hierarchy overhead must approach the chip cost and, when on-chip, must be much lower than chip cost. The ability of Silicon Microphotonics to meet these criteria will be evaluated with a timeline for both technology and  manufacturing volume.

References

[1] L. C. Kimerling and J. Michel, ECS Transactions, 41 (7) 3-13 (2011).

Biography:  Lionel C. Kimerling is the Thomas Lord Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at MIT. He is the founding Director of the MIT Microphotonics Center where he conducts an active research program in the design and processing of semiconductor materials and devices. He was Head of the Materials Physics Research Department at AT&T Bell Laboratories, when he joined the faculty of MIT as Professor in 1990. He has authored more than 350 technical articles and more than 50 patents. He leads the MIT-­‐Industry team of the Communication Technology Roadmap. Kimerling is the recipient of the 1995 Electronics Division Award of the Electrochemical Society, the 1996 MIT Perkins Award for Excellence in Graduate Advising, the 1997 Humboldt Senior Scientist Research Award and the 1999 John Bardeen Award of TMS. He is a Fellow of the  American Physical Society, a Fellow of the AAAS, a Fellow of TMS, a Fellow of  MRS and a Fellow of the School of Engineering of the University of Tokyo. His research has had fundamental impact on understanding of the chemical and electrical properties of defects in semiconductors and in the use of this knowledge for processing yield and component reliability. His research teams have enabled long-­‐lived telecommunications lasers, developed semiconductor diagnostic methods such as DLTS, SEM-­‐EBIC and RF-­‐PCD, and pioneered silicon microphotonics.