Near Packaged Optics Primer

Following FUNDA’s Near-Packaged Optics (NPO) report for institutional clients published on June 3^rd, we held very well-attended presentations to discuss the report and answer questions. If you would like to learn more about our offering for institutional clients, please reach out to sales@funda.ai.

In a Q&A below drawn from those discussions, we explain what NPO is, why there has been renewed interest in it, supply chain beneficiaries, and when the market should have more visibility on the size and durability of the opportunity.

1. What is NPO and how is it different from pluggable optics and CPO?

As network speeds move to 1.6T and beyond, we approach the physical limits of pluggable optics: high-speed electrical signals travelling from the center of a PCB to the front-panel optical module degrade, requiring more complex technologies and power to compensate.

The core idea of Near-Packaged Optics (NPO) is to move the optical module from the switch front panel closer to the switch ASIC, reducing the transmission distance of electrical signals.