Every accelerator added to an AI cluster increases the pressure on the optical links that carry data between machines. GlobalFoundries and Marvell want to relieve part of that pressure by widening a silicon germanium supply deal.
The multi-year agreement, announced on September 17, expands capacity for the specialty process at GlobalFoundries’ Burlington, Vermont site and locks in more volume for Marvell.
Silicon germanium carries high-frequency signals with low loss, which is why transceiver makers rely on it. The current portfolio runs at 200G per lane, and GlobalFoundries has a roadmap for faster generations as cloud bandwidth grows.
Marvell’s Robb Johnson said connectivity had become the constraint on how much performance operators can pull from their systems, and pointed toward higher-bandwidth optical designs as the next phase.
Shankaran Janardhanan, senior vice president of photonics and RF at GlobalFoundries, described the arrangement as an extension of a decade-long relationship and a signal of how much weight SiGe now carries in high-speed networking.
Both firms are working toward co-packaged and near-package optics, where transceiver functions migrate inside or beside switch and accelerator packages instead of sitting at the edge of a board. Marvell has been acquiring its way into that transition, while GlobalFoundries pitches photonics as growth beyond trailing-edge logic.
Putting the extra capacity in Vermont keeps a high-margin specialty line on US soil as buyers weigh supply security against cost.
