Blog on Electronically Tunable Lasers, Part 6: Manufacturing
John Dunne, CMO
(Please note that this is a continuation in a series of Blogs - see previous posts)

In my last 2 articles I introduced the electronically tunable laser (eventually) and compared it to other types, describing the state of the art in the industry today. In the next few blogs I would like to talk about all of the really practical issues around making and using these devices.

I have always believed that the only tunable laser type that would make it to volume production was the electronically tunable laser. In fact we bet the company on it – literally!

The reasons are:
• It can be “grown” like any semiconductor wafer by diffusing gases onto a base disk of semiconductor material, making 1000’s of lasers on one disk
• It is small enough to efficiently launch light into a fibre optic cable directly from the output light facet, so it can be tested at chip level
• It has no moving parts making it easier to handle and control reliably
• The ability to control it electronically at fast speeds ensures that a fast calibration time is possible
• The ability to control it electronically ensures that it can be controlled during operation
• There are well-known methods for testing the lifetime of the laser chips by accelerating their ageing using high temperatures and high control currents, and this enables predictable reliability
• Finally, it can be integrated with other micro-devices ensuring it has a roadmap for future development and market growth

Neither temperature tuned lasers nor mechanically tuned lasers can meet this list of criteria. Over the last 8 years, this list has helped the electronically tuned laser to dominate in the market and it is these fundamentals of manufacturing that made it happen.

So it proves that having a great technology is not always good enough, it must be capable of being manufactured for it to become used within industry and scale to any reasonable market size. This sounds so obvious, yet billions of dollars were invested in tunable laser technologies that blatantly didn’t meet the list of criteria given above.

Next time, I am going to talk about tunable laser calibration – something that I have spent most of my career involved in. This was the first significant industry problem that Intune solved and our first products were calibration solutions for the laser manufacturing industry.