OIDA Workshop on Integrated Photonics High Volume Packaging
Rebecca Andersen
Progress continues on the design and clean room fabrication of integrated photonics, and companies have commercialized products based on integrated photonics on both the InP and silicon platforms. There is growing awareness that the chip fabrication is less of a barrier to commercialization, and attention is increasingly turning to the cost of the overall package. This cost includes the bill of materials of the package itself, the amortized cost of assembly tools, and labor. Addressing the cost requires an examination of the entire ecosystem, from the chip design and fabrication to the assembly and surrounding electronics.
There are several notable efforts going on worldwide to address various aspects of this packaging challenge. Sunday’s workshop worked clarify the vision of the different elements of the ecosystem. Questions asked to participants included—where is the community currently headed with regard to manufacturing tools? Design software? Chip fabrication? Where will we be in five years?
“High volume packaging in integrated photonics is the hot topic. During this workshop we discussed the efforts in integration in the US, Europe and Japan. We discussed common challenges and how we can work together to solve them,” stated Tom Hausken, Senior Industry Advisor, The Optical Society.
Thomas Paatzsch, General Manager, Cube Optics said, “We attended today’s workshop because if you want to continue to bring down the costs of optical components, you still have to look into changing photonics packaging.”
Thomas Koch, Dean, College of Optical Sciences, University of Arizona remarked, “I came to the workshop today because the field of photonic packaging and integration is moving very quickly. To get the most out of these changes, we need to share with each other some of the experiences and ideas we have in packaging innovation. This workshop gives us the opportunity share what is currently being done around the world and how to move it forward.”
