Mercury Systems, US Navy Team Up on Photonics Chiplet Production

Mercury Systems has partnered with the U.S. Navy to develop manufacturing capabilities that will facilitate the use of commercial photonics chiplets in defense applications.

The collaboration is part of Project Kanagawa, an Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering initiative that seeks to advance the domestic supply chain and manufacturing processes for multi-chip packages, Mercury Systems said.

Photonics chiplets, using optical fibers, offer significant improvements in data bandwidth and efficiency compared to traditional copper connections.

Under a $3.9 million agreement with the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Mercury will gain access to photonics devices created by Intel and Ayar Labs. The devices can transfer data at speeds exceeding a terabyte per second.

Mercury’s goal is to develop compact, ruggedized packages with photonics chiplets for defense applications, enhancing the ingestion of edge sensor data and expediting decision-making in next-gen radar and electronic warfare systems.

The collaboration addresses the challenge of data transfer bottlenecks and aims to accelerate the adoption of innovative technology within the defense industrial base.