Low Power Consumption 10 Gbps×12 ch Parallel Optical Module for Optical Interconnection

Recently, with rapid increases in the data volume processed in data centers, great expectations are placed on the introduction of optical interconnects with a transmission speed of higher than 10 Gbps per channel. Whereas optical interconnects show superior performance in terms of long-distance transmission, high-data rate transmission and low power consumption, the advantage mentioned last is presently drawing special attention, as the consciousness for the environment is on the rise among IT equipment manufacturers. Furukawa Electric has been developing a compact 10 Gbps×12 ch parallel optical module that is applicable to both inter-equipment and intra-equipment communications in data centers, and by using low-power consumption ICs and our high-efficiency 1 µm-range VCSEL that allows low- bias current driving, we have recently achieved a low power consumption of 7 mW/Gbps. This paper presents the structure and characteristics of parallel optical modules. ABSTRACT