Juniper Networks (NYSE: JNPR; Sunnyvale, CA), a provider of automated, scalable, and secure optical networks, has entered into an agreement to acquire Aurrion (Santa Barbara, CA), which has developed a silicon photonics platform that includes the heterogeneous integration of InP materials.
Pradeep Sindhu, founder, vice chairman, and CTO at Juniper, wrote on a company blog, "We expect that Aurrion’s breakthrough technology will result in fundamental and permanent improvements in cost per bit-per-second, power per bit-per-second, bandwidth density, and flexibility of networking systems. If we couple this new technology with Juniper’s history of bringing innovative networking products to market, we believe we can make significant improvements to the foundations of all of our networking products within a relatively short time."
Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed. Aurrion was co-founded in 2008 by Alexander Fang, the CEO; Gregory Fish is CTO. The chairman and co-founder of Aurrion is John Bowers, a professor at UC Santa Barbara. Milton Chang interviewed Alexander Fang in a May 2014 article for Laser Focus World. It is worth reading to understand the history of the company and importance of silicon photonics:
Business Forum: Integrating photonics with electronics
Also here is an article to help explain the technical issues and opportunities with silicon photonics and one from our sister publication, Lightwave, that shows how Aurrion will fit into the Juniper products and systems:
Silicon photonics evolves to meet real-world requirements (Laser Focus World)
Juniper Networks to buy silicon photonics company Aurrion (Lightwave)
Source: Juniper Networks
Conard Holton
Conard Holton has 25 years of science and technology editing and writing experience. He was formerly a staff member and consultant for government agencies such as the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority and the International Atomic Energy Agency, and engineering companies such as Bechtel. He joined Laser Focus World in 1997 as senior editor, becoming editor in chief of WDM Solutions, which he founded in 1999. In 2003 he joined Vision Systems Design as editor in chief, while continuing as contributing editor at Laser Focus World. Conard became editor in chief of Laser Focus World in August 2011, a role in which he served through August 2018. He then served as Editor at Large for Laser Focus World and Co-Chair of the Lasers & Photonics Marketplace Seminar from August 2018 through January 2022. He received his B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania, with additional studies at the Colorado School of Mines and Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.