TSMC COUPE Platform — First Integrated Optical Connectivity Solution

Key Innovation

• COUPE (COmpact Universal Photonic Engine) — TSMC's standardized silicon photonics integration platform
• First fully integrated, in-package optical I/O engine built on COUPE
• Delivers up to 100 Tb/s of bandwidth per accelerator
• Connects to other chips using UCIe (Universal Chiplet Interconnect Express) standard

Architecture

• EIC-PIC integration — electrical IC and photonic IC co-packaged
• Minimizes coupling loss with low insertion loss for both grating and edge couplers
• EPIC-BOE platform features system-level integration of COUPE + COI + iFAU
• Enables CPO within 2.5D CoWoS environment — fits into existing advanced packaging

Ecosystem

• Alchip — ASIC design partner providing the electrical IC
• Ayar Labs — TeraPHY optical chiplet provider
• TSMC — foundry platform and packaging (COUPE + CoWoS)
• This is the first end-to-end demonstrated solution for optical I/O in AI chips

Significance

• Proves silicon photonics can integrate into standard TSMC packaging flows
• UCIe compatibility means any chiplet ecosystem participant can adopt optical I/O
• 100 Tb/s per accelerator eliminates bandwidth wall for next-gen AI training
• Path to all major AI chip companies (Nvidia, AMD, Google, etc.) using optical I/O

Source: TSMC COUPE optical connectivity — Tom's Hardware, 2025