Imagine the internet's backbone as a highway. Right now, data has to stop at electronic toll booths to be routed, which slows things down and wastes power. This project builds a 'glass highway' where data stays as light, moving much faster and using almost no energy to switch directions.
Current 6G network goals are hindered by electronic routers that consume too much power and create bottlenecks. This leads to high operational costs and latency that cannot support ultra-high-speed data demands.
The project is building photonic/plasmonic transceiver interfaces and optical switching nodes controlled by an ML-enabled SDN control plane.
If you are a 6G infrastructure provider dealing with massive data congestion — this project developed optical switching nodes that enable 10 Pb/s throughput per node. This allows you to scale capacity without adding power-hungry electronic routers.
If you are a data center operator dealing with soaring electricity costs for networking — this project developed photonic interfaces achieving sub-pJ per switched bit. This drastically reduces the energy footprint of moving data between servers.
If you are a hardware manufacturer dealing with the limits of electronic switching speeds — this project developed transceiver interfaces with 10 Tb/s rates. This enables the production of next-generation disaggregated open networks.
The project aims for low cost by using photonic integration and optical transparency to replace or bypass expensive and power-hungry electronic processing systems.
Yes, the project targets massive industrial scales, specifically aiming for 10 Pb/s throughput per optical node and 1 Pb/s capacity per link.
Based on available project data, the consortium includes 9 industry partners and 6 SMEs focused on exploitation towards new products and standards contributions, though specific licenses are not listed.
The project has defined requirements to achieve network reconfiguration in 10 μs.
The project is active from 2023-01-01 to 2026-03-31, with initial requirements and prototypes already fabricated in the first year.
The consortium is heavily industry-weighted with a 56% industry ratio, comprising 9 industrial partners including 6 SMEs. This balance, combined with 5 universities and 2 research centers across 9 countries, suggests a strong drive toward commercialization and standards alignment rather than purely academic research.
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