
With Ukraine the top supplier of neon gas-a critical chip component-to the US, the conflict is expected to also affect the photonics sector, which could dampen its outlook.

It’s a moonshot and yet, the young company. What’s the catch?Following two years of supply chain disruptions from the coronavirus pandemic, Russia’s war in Ukraine is another foe for the semiconductor industry. Luminous Computing, a one-year-old startup, is aiming to build a photonics chip that will handle workloads needed for AI at the speed of light.

Lightspeed data processing:Since photonic chips use light to transmit data instead of the electrons used in their conventional counterparts, the technology promises faster, more powerful, and more efficient computers. Hewlett Packard Enterprise struck a multi-year strategic collaboration with Ayar Labs to harness the startup’s silicon photonic tech, which can reportedly achieve 1,000x the bandwidth of electrical I/O circuitry with just one-tenth of the power, for use in the HPE Slingshot, per ZDNet.

LUMINOUS COMPUTING AI 105M GATES 200M300MWIGGERSVENTUREBEAT SERIES
One company in the photonics space, Luminous Computing, has raised $105 million in Series A funding, including from Bill Gates, and recently divulged plans to build an AI supercomputer using light-based technology, per The Next Platform.
