French startup Scintil Photonics has begun providing its laser chips to customers for testing.
The company’s chips use optical signals to move data, a technology expected to ease the linking of multiple chips in AI servers. Nvidia is set to discuss its plans for co-packaged optics at a developer conference next week.
All-optical systems require laser chips made with indium phosphide, a material currently in short supply for AI data centers. This shortage prompted Nvidia to invest $2 billion each in Lumentum and Coherent earlier this month.
Scintil secured funding from Nvidia in a $58 million funding round last year. The company packages indium phosphide lasers with other optical elements into a single chip.
Scintil works with Israel-based Tower Semiconductor as a manufacturing partner. The startup aims to produce hundreds of thousands of chips per month by 2028.
Matt Crowley, Scintil’s CEO, said the company is in discussions with six to seven companies that want to use its technology by 2028. He declined to name them due to nondisclosure agreements.
“The way we make it is fundamentally different,” Crowley stated. “We can mass produce them … and we can satisfy a big chunk of the market.”
