UK-based CMOS IC vendor HiLight Semiconductor says it has shipped a million of its 25-Gbps transimpedance amplifiers (TIAs) since the beginning of this year. The HLR25G0 and the HLR25G1 TIAs primarily have been designed into optical transceivers for 5G mobile and data center network applications, according to the company.
The HLR25G0 targets PIN photodiode applications and the HLR25G1 pairs best with APDs, HiLight says. The two TIAs feature internal digital temperature control of key parameters to ensure the proper sensitivity and overload performance across the operating temperature range. The HLC25G0 is particularly suited to TO-can and chip-on-board applications, especially the TO33 typical in 25G and 100G optical modules. The TIA has adjustable gain and a wide photodiode input capacitance range to enable compatibility with multiple photodiode types and all 5-, 6-, and 7-pin TO formats, HiLight asserts. It also meets industry standards for optical sensitivity and overload with input powers of up to +4.5 dBm at 4.5 dB ER.
The HLR25G1, meanwhile, can achieve sensitivities of better than -24 dBm (BER 5E-5) in TO-can ROSAs. HiLight says it performs well in applications that require high receiver performance for links of 10 km or more.
“Reaching this milestone in such a short time period demonstrates the demand for HiLight’s cost-effective high-performance TIA products whilst our customers can design with confidence knowing that year-on-year cost-downs are possible on CMOS 12-inch wafers,” commented Christian Rookes, vice president, marketing at HiLight. “This milestone comes shortly after HiLight exceeded total shipments of 80 million CMOS ICs and the forecasted demand in 5G fronthaul, 10G-PON, and data center optical interconnects suggests a period of rapid growth lies ahead for which HiLight is well positioned to take advantage of.”
John Lively, principal analyst at LightCounting Market Research, believes Rookes may have a point. “5G fronthaul has driven demand for 25G transceivers from a quarter of a million a few years ago to more than ten million in 2020, and we expect more than 70 million units to be shipped for 5G fronthaul by 2025, counting both grey and colored (WDM) optics,” said Lively via a HiLight press release. “China is consuming the vast majority of 25G transceivers today, due to its ambitious 5G deployment schedule. 25G server connections is another application that we expect to drive growth in the 25G optics over the next five years, and the same technology is used in some 100G (4x25G) transceivers as well.”
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