Redfern Integrated Optics, Inc. (RIO), an optical chip and foundry services company, has secured $6.2 million in
financing from Advent International, Tallwood Venture Capital, TMT Ventures and Redfern Photonics Pty Ltd. The company plans
to continue its focus on the 10G market through its focus on low cost 40/80 kilometer Dense Wavelength-Division Multiplexing
(DWDM) XFP-compatible TOSAs (Transmitter Optical Sub-Assembly)." According to Radu Barsan, CEO of RIO, "In addition to the
customer validation that RIO has secured to date and the development of the 10G market, this financing puts us in an excellent
position to capitalize on our breakthrough platform technology. Such financial support represents a significant endorsement
of RIO's value proposition and will enable us to continue to meet the growing needs of our customers for high-performance,
low-cost 40/80km and DWDM XFP-compatible TOSAs.”
The company indicated also that the financing would be used to complete the development of its initial products,
increase its product line and bring production up to commercial levels.
The company’s External Cavity Laser (ECL) product is marketed as a low-cost alternative to the typical costly,
low yielding hybrid solution that is used to integrate modulated lasers (made with Indium Phosphide - InP) the Distributed
Feedback (DFB) laser and the Electro-Absorbtion (EA) modulator. The ECL product integrates together an InP gain chip, which
is a modified Fabry-Perot diode and a Photonic Lightwave Circuit (PLC). The company trademarks the solution as
“Telecom performance at Ethernet cost."
RIO also offers to its customers a silicon-based optical foundry
service for the development of photonic designs. Among the serviced provided include design, modeling, prototype, assembly
and test services.
XFP is the standard adopted by the XFP MSA group and refers to 10
Gbit Small Form Factor Pluggable. The goal of the group is to provide a low cost standard module design for the implementation
10 Gibabit per second data communications solutions. The group’s founding members include Broadcom, Brocade, Emulex
Corporation, Finisar, ICS (a Sumitomo Electric company), JDS Uniphase, Maxim Integrated Products, ONI Systems, Tyco Electronics
and Velio.
