The Global Market for Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC) is Projected to Reach US$1 Billion by 2020

Growing Interest in High Capacity “Speed of Light” Optical Networks Drives Demand for Photonic Integrated Circuit, According to a New Report by Global Industry Analysts, Inc.

GIA launches comprehensive analysis of industry segments, trends, growth drivers, market share, size and demand forecasts on the global Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC) market. The global market for Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC) is projected to reach US$1 billion by 2020, driven by the growing focus on silicon photonics for enabling computing and data transmission at the speed of light. Also, driving growth are growing investments in OTN and FTTx infrastructure, and increasing use of fiber optic technologies in numerous end-use applications including sensing and biophotonics, among others.

The global market for Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC) is witnessing rapid growth. While sustained high growth in the deployment and expansion of communication networks with fiber optic infrastructure is building strong momentum for PICs, increased use of fiber optics in signal transmission, sensing, and biophotonics is creating a highly conducive environment for growth and proliferation of PICs, on a wider scale. The growth in the market is also benefitting from the dramatic growth in telecom and datacom sectors over the past few years driven by steep increase in the ownership rates of IP-enabled devices and number of Internet users, and growing investments in the roll out of advanced communication networks such as 100G and ultra-100G networks. Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC), also called as integrated optical circuit or simply optical chip, is a semiconductor solution engineered to integrate multiple optical elements on a single chip. PICs rely on photons to transmit information in a communication network, and facilitate faster communication than is possible with standard electronic ICs by leveraging the capability of photons in demonstrating data transfer rates equivalent to the speed of light.

PIC seamlessly integrates several optical components such as multiplexers, de-multiplexers, modulators, lasers, attenuators, detectors, and optical amplifiers and extends benefits such as high performance, low-power, low-price and small footprint. Majority of PICs are based on packaging integration or hybrid integration, which involves integration of multiple discrete optical and electrical components into a single package. On the other hand, monolithic integration that focuses on combining multiple devices and functions into one combined PIC and package is seen gathering steam in the PIC manufacture. Indium Phosphide (InP) constitutes the most widely used material for making PICs, and of late, silicon substrates are seen making rapid progress in PIC manufacturing. Use case of PIC continues to expand given the large-scale benefits offered in areas such as Optical-to-Electrical-to-Optical (OEO) conversion, number of optical packages, fiber coupling requirements and need for separate fabrication, packaging, burn-in and testing processes for each component to achieve desired efficiency.

As stated by the new market research report on Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC), the United States represents the largest market worldwide. Robust investments on telecom networks and rising FTTX and OTN deployments are positively influencing growth in the country. Asia-Pacific is poised to emerge as the fastest growing market with a CAGR of 32.1% over the analysis period, led by developing telecom and electronics industries and rapid shift of the global semiconductor manufacturing base to Southeast Asian countries.   

Major players covered in the report include Alcatel-Lucent, Avago Technologies, Ciena Corporation, Enablence Technologies, Huawei Technologies Co., Infinera Corporation, Kaiam Corporation, Lumentum Holdings, NeoPhotonics Corporation, and Oclaro, among others.

The research report titled “Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC): A Global Strategic Business Report” announced by Global Industry Analysts Inc., provides a comprehensive review of market trends, issues, drivers, mergers, acquisitions and other strategic industry activities of global companies. The report provides market estimates and projections for Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC) in US$ Thousand for all major geographic markets such as the US, Canada, Japan, Europe (France, Germany, Italy, UK, Spain, Russia and Rest of Europe), Asia-Pacific (China, South Korea, and Rest of Asia-Pacific), Latin America (Brazil and Rest of Latin America), and Rest of World. The report analyzes PIC market by application – Optical Signal Processing, Optical Communications, and Others (Biophotonics, and Sensing). The report also analyzes the PIC market by integration methods – Packaging and Others (Module Integration, and Monolithic Integration). 

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