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Japan's TDK claims a breakthrough in optical technology that processes data ten times faster than the present electronics and a vital bottleneck that holds the expansion of generative artificial intelligence.
The Apple supplier said that he had shown the world's first “spin photo” that mixes optical, electronic and magnetic elements in an effort to replace response times of 20 pikoseconds or 20 trillion of a second and possibly replaced semiconductor base-based photo detectors that transmit data between chips.
Hideaki Fukuzawa, senior manager of the following generation of TDK product development center, said the speed at which AI processors could transmit data was severely restricted by current electronics.
“This data transmission is more of the most important bottleneck for AI than for the semiconductor GPU performance,” he said. “Since we will break through most of the current bottlenecks, we consider that this technology can be a player for the AI and data center industry.”
Arata Tsukamoto, professor of electrical engineering at Nihon University in Tokyo, tested the brand new device for TDK as his research partner and said that he was “the Spin photo photo is a remarkable promise from each a scientific and technological perspective.”
The data is currently transmitted by electrical signals between the processors, but the big volumes in AI require a shift towards optical technology because the sunshine moves faster.
TDK plans further tests to substantiate the continual light at ultra-high-high speeds before making customers available to customers by the top of March 2026 and entering mass production in the following three to 5 years.
Despite the immaturity of the technology and the largest challenge in constructing an ecosystem for technology with integrated circuit arsin, TDK is of the opinion that his device could have a price advantage over other solutions by reducing the variety of wafer processes.
TDK delivers batteries for the iPhone, but has adapted its magnetic heads technology for hard window drives to attain the breakthrough of photonics.
The recent device also uses less power – one other vital problem with the expansion of the AI data center. Intelligent glasses for augmented and virtual reality and high speed image sensors are also potential future markets for technology.
The device is an element of the marketplace for photonic integrated circuits and, based on forecasts of the Tech research group IDTECECHEX, can be expanded by greater than ten times in the following decade as a result of the necessities of the generative AI.
Large AI firms have also tried to develop transceiver that integrate optical technologies into their chip packages, and the Tech of TDK can be a challenger for such a next generation silicon photonics.
The world's largest chip maker, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, urges an advance and strives for production inside five years.
NVIDIA also signaled how vital it’s to resolve the info transmission bottleneck when $ 7 billion in 2020 for the acquisition of Israel Mellanox Technologies, a specialist to enable efficient connections between networks, systems and data centers.
