OREANDA-NEWS. November 09, 2011. Fujitsu Laboratories Limited and Furukawa Electric Co., Ltd. have jointly developed optical interconnect technology for the high-speed, large-bandwidth internal data transmissions that will be needed for the next generation of high-performance servers.

To develop the next generation of high-performance servers, several hurdles need to be overcome. Specifically, transmissions via the currently used copper wire present limitations with increasing speed and bandwidth. With optical transmission over fiber-optic lines, on the other hand, issues arise concerning required space. Now Fujitsu Laboratories and Furukawa Electric have developed optical interconnect technology that increases the density of fiber-optic lines while enabling high-bandwidth internal communications at speeds of 50 terabits per second (Tbps), ten times faster than is possible with today’s copper lines.

This technology promises to enable high-bandwidth, high-performance servers capable of a wide range of services involving real-time analysis of huge amounts of data from sensors, such as forecasts of traffic congestion and of electric-power demand.