Five Taiwanese Companies Packaging Light and Electricity Together
Five Taiwanese test equipment companies have carved up the CPO inspection market. CPO, or co-packaged optics, is a technology that transmits data with light instead of electrical signals inside a silicon chip. By combining optical components and computing chips into a single package, it shortens signal travel distances, sharply cutting power consumption and transmission latency.
As the technology approaches mass production, the back-end inspection environment is also changing. While conventional semiconductor testing measured only electrical signals, CPO requires optical measurement and thermal control to be performed simultaneously across the entire packaging process. These composite measurement demands have raised the technical barriers to entry for test equipment.
CPO testing is divided into four test insertion points. Stage one is wafer-level defect inspection of photonic devices before packaging; stage two is optoelectronic testing after bonding the electronic and photonic devices; stage three is optical engine testing; and stage four is integrated verification of the optical and electrical functions of the finished system. Taiwanese companies developed equipment tailored to each insertion point.
Fiber Optic Communications has partnered with wafer inspection firms to screen out defective dies in advance with fiber array probe cards for stage one. Hermes Testing Solutions is targeting the front end of the process with thin-film probe cards for high-speed signals. GMT Global has entered stage three with 1.6-terabit-per-second (Tbps) alignment systems, while Allring Technology is developing assembly and inspection automation equipment covering fiber array bonding and adhesive dispensing. Hon Precision is pushing into stage four final testing with system-level test handlers and temperature control technology. However, Taiwan News, citing Commercial Times, reported that not all five companies have yet secured mass production supply contracts.
References for inspection equipment by CPO process stage—integrating optical and electronic packaging—have already been secured by the Taiwanese camp. Korean probe card and back-end test equipment companies remain concentrated in an electrical signal measurement structure centered on memory semiconductors. They face the challenge that, without composite measurement test interfaces, failing to secure early references could leave them confronting market entry barriers.
