Overcoming interconnect obstacles with co-packaged optics (CPO)

By Larry Zu

March 27, 2026

Over the last few years, there has been growing interest across the global semiconductor packaging industry with a new approach. Co-packaged optics (CPO) involves integrating optical fibers, used for data transmission, directly onto the same package or photonic IC die as semiconductor chips.

Traditionally, semiconductor packaging has used copper interconnects, but these can consume large amounts of power and lead to signal weakening at high frequencies when the distance is further than a couple of meters.

With CPO, the optical components are integrated directly into a package, and the long copper trace between the switch and the optical module is replaced with short, high-integrity connections. Optical signaling uses far less power at high data rates than electrical signaling. As CPO reduces the distance between optical components and the semiconductor dice, this lowers latency, improves high-speed signal integrity, and accelerates data transfer.

All of which are fundamental for the next generation of AI devices for high performance computing (HPC) inside the data center systems. Nevertheless, there are obstacles that need to be overcome with CPO and when designing photonic packages, especially for integrated photonic circuits or photonic chips. This is why advances in photonic package design are coming to the forefront.

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