Alphawave Semi is stepping firmly into the AI connectivity race, unveiling a suite of 3nm chiplet-based products designed to power the next generation of AI datacentre infrastructure. With demand for high-performance optical and copper connectivity surging, Alphawave’s bold expansion into silicon-based solutions is poised to shake up the fast-growing market for advanced data interconnects.
Alphawave Semi has launched a dedicated connectivity business unit focused on delivering high-speed silicon photonics solutions for AI datacentres, driven by its newly developed 3nm digital signal processors (DSPs). These DSPs, offered as known good die (KGD), support both PAM4 and the emerging Coherent-lite modulation technologies for ultra-high bandwidth links—800G and 1.6T—over optical fibres and active copper cables.
This strategic pivot follows the company’s successful transition in 2023 from a pure IP model to shipping fully developed silicon products. At the heart of these innovations are Alphawave’s proprietary WidEye DSP architecture and EyeQ diagnostics platform, which collectively optimise signal integrity and data throughput across a variety of transmission media.
CEO Tony Pialis underscored the flexibility this new business brings to hyperscalers, stating that Alphawave can now provide custom IP, chiplets, or complete silicon solutions. The Connectivity Products Group, he says, is a strategic asset that positions the company as a formidable player in the AI compute and interconnect landscape.
Among the standout offerings is the Cu-Wave DSP, a 3nm PAM4 solution for active electrical cables capable of handling up to 1.6Tbps across short-reach copper. Its counterpart, the O-Wave, targets 200G optical transceivers supporting fibre links up to 2km. Meanwhile, the Co-Wave DSP marks a notable push into Coherent-lite modulation, enabling low-power, long-reach optical communication up to 20km for campus-wide AI cluster connectivity.
The flagship Co-Wave product, the AW400-O, integrates a latency-optimised Coherent-lite DSP using DP-QAM16 modulation, complete with a NIST-certified security engine to ensure encrypted data links between datacentres. This makes Alphawave’s silicon especially attractive for hyperscalers investing in AI-specific campus designs.
According to Babak Samimi, SVP and GM of the new Connectivity Products Group, this move reflects a deliberate investment into the high-speed optoelectronics semiconductor market, a sector rapidly expanding as AI workloads outgrow conventional data architecture. By combining expertise in high-speed SerDes, SoC design, signal integrity, and advanced diagnostics, Alphawave has built a portfolio designed to meet the future needs of data infrastructure.
The company is already working with a major North American hyperscaler and key ecosystem partners to bring these solutions to market within the next year. Market analyst Vladimir Kozlov notes that Alphawave’s dual capability in both PAM4 and Coherent-lite DSPs places it among a select group poised to benefit from a market projected to exceed $4 billion by 2028.
Alphawave IP Group plc (LON:AWE) is a semiconductor IP company focused on providing DSP based, multi-standard connectivity Silicon IP solutions targeting both data processing in the Datacenter and data generation by IoT end devices.
