Heterogeneous integration of III–V on silicon for system-in-package photonic transceivers

Heterogeneous integration enables high performance active components such as lasers, modulators, and photodetectors to be elegantly integrated on a silicon photonics platform with high performance passive components. This platform also offers the unique capability to combine different types of active devices with separately optimized materials on the same wafer, die, and photonic integrated circuit. Experimental demonstrations show that these active components can achieve performance on par with commercially available discrete III–V components. Furthermore, the technique enables the consolidation of a complete optical transceivers onto a singular silicon substrate enabling the development of system-in-package architectures and assembly processes that are indistinguishable from those used in standard electronic packaging. In this paper we will discuss the advantages of this heterogeneous integration platform and discuss prototype demonstrations.