OFC 2025 industry reflections - Final Part

Gazettabyte has been asking industry figures for their thoughts after attending the OFC conference held in San Francisco.

In the final part, Arista’s Vijay Vusirikala and Andy Bechtolsheim, Chris Doerr of Aloe Semiconductor, Adtran’s Jörg-Peter Elbers, and Omdia’s Daryl Inniss share their learnings. Vusirikala, Doerr, and Elbers all participated in OFC’s excellent Rump Session.

Muir Woods National Monument, outside San Francisco

Vijay Vusirikala, Distinguished Lead, AI Systems and Networks, and Andy Bechtolsheim, Chief Architect, at Arista Networks.

OFC 2025 wasn't just another conference. The event felt like a significant momentum-gaining inflexion point, buzzing with an energy reminiscent of the Dot.com era optical boom.

This palpable excitement, reflected in record attendance and exhibitor numbers, was accentuated for the broader community by the context set at Nvidia’s GTC event held two weeks before OFC, highlighting the critical role optical technologies play in enabling next-generation AI infrastructure. 

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OFC 2025: reflecting on the busiest optics show in years

Adtran's Gareth Spence interviews Omdia's Daryl Inniss (left) and the editor of Gazettabyte, live from the conference hall at OFC 2025. 

The discussion covers the hot topics of the show and where the industry is headed next. Click here.

Podcast: Is AI driving a new wave of photonic innovation?

AI is still in its infancy, but it’s already pushing the photonics and computing industries to rethink product roadmaps and drive new levels of innovation.

Adtran's Gareth Spence talks with authors and analysts Daryl Inniss and the editor of Gazettabyte about the fast pace of AI development and the changes needed to unlock its full potential. They also discuss the upcoming sequel to their book on silicon photonics and its focus on AI. 

To listen to the podcast, click here.

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OFC 2024 industry reflections: Part 3

Gazettabyte is asking industry figures for their thoughts after attending the recent OFC show in San Diego. Here are the thoughts of BT's Professor Andrew Lord, author and consultant, Daryl Inniss, and Cignal AI's Kyle Hollasch.

Andrew Lord, senior manager of research and optical networks, BT Group.

I am excited to see the developments around 100G ZR pluggables. Assuming they can hit the power requirements, I can imagine them being used across the edge for years to come.

I learned that there is some confidence in the optical community that optics has a significant part to play in the AI revolution. But this is still primarily associated with high bit rate transport, whether it be fibres or inter-chip. Photonic integrated switches to assist with future GPUs is, on the other hand, likely to be limited by the wavelength of light and resulting small numbers of components on a realistic-sized photonic integrated circuit.

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AI and optics: An OFC conversation

An OFC conversation with Adtran's Gareth Spence and consultant Daryl Inniss about the AI opportunity for photonics, click here.   

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The status of silicon photonics - an ECOC interview

Daryl Inniss and I being interviewed at ECOC by Adtran's Gareth Spence about the state of silicon photonics.  

 

Click here for the interview.

Books read in 2021: Final Part

In the final favoured reads during 2021, the contributors are Daryl Inniss of OFS, Vladimir Kozlov of LightCounting Market Research, and Gazettabyte’s editor.

Daryl Inniss, Director, Business Development at OFS

Four thousand weeks is the average human lifetime.

The book by Oliver Burkeman: Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management For Mortals is a guide to using the finite duration of our lives.

Burkeman argues that by ignoring the reality of our limited lifetime, we fill our lives with busyness and distractions and fail to achieve the very fullness that we seek.

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