The Automation Crisis

Stephanie A. Weiss, Editorial Director

Physics is all that stands between Intel and photonics. Intel knows volume manufacturing, it knows how to integrate many functions on one chip, and it knows that communications is a significant growth market.

So why didn't the massive chip maker step in last summer when photonics companies faltered in producing enough lasers, optics and other devices to satisfy customers? Because Intel doesn't know photons, and there's more to making photonics than tweaking an electronics process…