Tower Semiconductor and Scintil Photonics have announced the availability of the world's first heterogeneously integrated Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) laser sources for AI infrastructure. The solution uses Scintil’s SHIP (Scintil Heterogeneous Integrated Photonics) technology on Tower’s high-volume silicon photonics platform, combining it with heterogeneous integration of monolithic laser sources to address demanding DWDM requirements for AI applications.
DWDM lasers serve as an essential component in Co-Packaged Optics (CPO) for next-generation AI infrastructure, targeting higher bandwidth density, ultra-low tail latency, and lower energy per bit, while supporting improved GPU utilization and hyperscaler ROI in the agentic AI era.
Scintil’s SHIP technology has been validated on Tower’s silicon photonics platform. LEAF Light is the industry’s first DWDM-optimized, intelligent integrated laser source fabricated with SHIP. It is the first production-ready DWDM laser source using heterogeneous integration to monolithically integrate active lasers and established silicon photonics on a single chip.
Tower Semiconductor’s multi-site global manufacturing footprint provides resilient capacity and supply continuity for hyperscale deployment needs. The partnership supports customer evaluations for DWDM CPO programs and establishes a path from qualification to volume manufacturing.
Matt Crowley, Chief Executive Officer of Scintil Photonics, stated that next-generation AI infrastructure requires optical interconnects delivering more bandwidth per fiber at lower power per bit, with DWDM CPO meeting that requirement. LEAF Light provides the DWDM laser source technology, while Tower’s SiPho platform offers manufacturing scale, with SHIP validated on Tower’s production lines for a path from evaluation to millions of units per month.
Dr. Ed Preisler, VP and GM of RF Business Unit at Tower Semiconductor, noted the long-term partnership with Scintil and the introduction of monolithic DWDM laser technology to enable next-generation scale-up architectures, complementing Tower’s PH18M platform already in mass production for optical transceivers at facilities worldwide.
Alan Weckel, Founder and Technology Analyst at 650 Group, LLC, commented that scale-up networking will increase as server interconnects shift to multirack CPO, consuming a larger portion of AI Networking’s projected $200B market by 2030 through optical architectures that reduce beachhead and copper bandwidth limitations per GPU/XPU. Manufacturing and foundry alignment is key to unlocking the CPO market for reliability and volumes needed by hyperscalers.
Additional details and the Scintil manufacturing roadmap will be available at Scintil Photonics’ booth #5537 during the OFC 2026 Conference in Los Angeles, March 17–19. Tower Semiconductor will exhibit at booth #2221 during the same event, with representatives from both companies available for meetings.
