Nubis Communications and Samtec have announced a jointly developed optical and copper-based solution designed to support co-packaged optics (CPO) in advanced AI data centers. The new offering combines Nubis’s Puma Silicon Photonics Integrated Circuit (IC)—a 200G-per-lane silicon photonics solution—with Samtec’s Si-Fly HD interconnect platform, which includes high-density 224 Gbps PAM4 co-packaged and near-chip cable systems.
The Puma silicon photonics IC offers 16 integrated transmitters and 16 integrated receivers, each capable of 224 Gbps. Nubis claims this high-density IC achieves a beachfront density of 1 Tbps/mm through specialized 60 GHz high-density Mach-Zehnder (MZ) modulators designed for enhanced reliability and compliance with industry standards. Nubis reports that Puma’s compact design integrates seamlessly with the Samtec Si-Fly HD Co-Packaged CPX socket, providing a direct optics-to-electrical connector interface to address signal integrity challenges at these speeds. This approach is intended to achieve up to 6.4 Tbps performance and improved power efficiency compared to conventional optical transceivers.
Through their collaboration, Nubis and Samtec aim to leverage a common co-packaging footprint termed “CPX,” enabling interoperability between copper and optical connectivity within the same hardware architecture. The CPX approach gives data center operators flexibility at the individual link level to choose optics or copper without prior commitment to locking in designs years in advance, thus reducing cost and complexity of adopting co-packaged optics.
“Samtec’s Si-Fly HD co-packaged and near-chip systems provide the highest density 224 Gbps PAM4 solution in today’s market,” said Jignesh Shah, Technologist at Samtec. “In AI clustering, enabling flexibility between copper and optics provides an architectural advantage, increased reach, and improved performance. We are pleased to collaborate with Nubis due to their groundbreaking, industry-leading 200G/lane CPO silicon photonics technology. Together, Nubis and Samtec bring the advantages of copper and optics interoperability, enabling architecture flexibility and rapid optical deployment in AI cluster networks.”
According to Nubis founder and CTO Peter Winzer, “We can fit 200G per lane optics in the same footprint as 200G per lane high-density passive copper,” explained Peter Winzer, Nubis founder and CTO. “This greatly lowers the barrier to adoption and is a major breakthrough for co-packaged optics.”
The Nubis optical engine compatible with Samtec’s Si-Fly CPC system is expected to become available in the second half of 2025, while Samtec’s Si-Fly HD 224 Gbps PAM4 co-packaged and near-chip solutions are currently sampling.
Source: Nubis Communications and Samtec
