Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised Jun 3, 2026

Luxtera

Luxtera Inc., a subsidiary of Cisco Systems, is a semiconductor company that uses silicon photonics technology to build complex electro-optical systems in a production silicon CMOS process.

Last revised
Jun 3, 2026
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≈ 2 min
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Luxtera Inc.
Company type
Subsidiary of Cisco Systems
IndustrySemiconductors
Founded2001 (2001)
FounderAxel Scherer
Michael Hochberg
Tom Baehr-Jones
Eli Yablonovitch
HeadquartersCarlsbad, California
ProductsBlazar
ParentCisco Systems
Websitewww.luxtera.com

Luxtera Inc., a subsidiary of Cisco Systems, is a semiconductor company that uses silicon photonics technology to build complex electro-optical systems in a production silicon CMOS process.1

The company uses fabless manufacturing; it uses semiconductor fabrication plants of Freescale Semiconductor.

The company received $130 million in funding and was acquired by Cisco Systems in 2019 for $660 million.2

History

The company was founded in 2001 by a group of professors and students at California Institute of Technology including Axel Scherer, Michael Hochberg, Tom Baehr-Jones, Eli Yablonovitch, Alex Dickinson and Lawrence C Gunn.3

In 2006, the company received a $5 million contract from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.4

In August 2007, the company introduced Blazar, a 40GB optical active cable for interconnect within high performance computer clusters using single-mode optical fiber.5

In 2010, Luxtera was selected as one of MIT Technology Review's 50 Most Innovative Companies.6

In February 2019, Cisco Systems acquired the company.7

Products

Luxtera sold embedded optical transceiver that were aimed at use in data centers, within telecom networks or companies, with the last transceiver using the QSFP 100G PSM4 specification.89 The company's cables used silicon photonics technology to send photonic data from their cables directly to semiconductors without first converting the data into electrical signals.1

References

References

  1. Cooney, Michael (December 18, 2018). "Cisco bets $660M on silicon-photonics firm Luxtera". International Data Group.
  2. Miller, Ron (December 18, 2018). "cisco-to-acquire-silicon-photonics-chip-maker-luxtera-for-660-million". TechCrunch.
  3. Bigelow, Bruce V. (March 1, 2012). "With $21.7M in New Funding, Luxtera Signs Deal to Make Optical Chip". Xconomy.
  4. "Darpa renews Luxtera's transceiver contract". EE Times. November 8, 2006.
  5. Scouras, Ismini (November 12, 2007). "Active cables extend reach 3X". EE Times.
  6. "MIT's Technology Review Unveils 2010 TR50 List of the World's Most Innovative Companies" (Press release). Business Wire. February 23, 2010.
  7. "Cisco Completes Acquisition of Luxtera" (Press release). Cisco Systems. February 7, 2019.
  8. "Luxtera ships 2x100-Gbps PSM4 silicon photonics embedded optical transceiver". lightwaveonline.com. 2017-03-23. Retrieved 2024-06-12.
  9. "100G-PSM4 Product Family". luxtera.com. Archived from the original on 2019-09-05. Retrieved 2024-06-12.
External links