TechFlow reported on June 17, citing Semiconductor-Today, that Coherent has announced the signing of a letter of intent with the U.S. Department of Commerce. Under the arrangement, the company plans to receive up to $50 million in direct funding based on the CHIPS and Science Act.
The funding is intended for the expansion of advanced manufacturing capacity for AI photonic chips. Coherent said the capacity buildout will strengthen the domestic U.S. photonic chip supply chain and support demand from AI computing infrastructure for high-speed data transmission.
According to Coherent, the expansion is also tied to easing communication bottlenecks created by large-scale AI computing. The company said it will work with Nvidia to advance optical networking and interconnect technologies for AI “data center factories.” Nvidia previously announced that it would invest $2 billion in Coherent.