The Circuit · 21 Sept 2026 · 50m · Episode 186
Mark Wade, CEO of Ayar Labs, and Jesse Leiter, VP of Capital Strategy, discuss the company's strategy to solve the interconnect bottleneck in AI data centers using co-packaged optics (CPO). Wade explains the technical complexity of integrating silicon photonics into TSMC's advanced CMOS nodes and the strategic importance of partnerships with NVIDIA, AMD, and Intel. Leiter details Ayar Labs' funding journey, including a recent $650 million raise and strategic investments from major tech giants, positioning the company for an eventual IPO in a market projected to reach $30-50 billion by 2030.
Where this conversation describes AI being used to build or deliver a product. Part of the AI in practice tracker.
Running the company
The company used AI coding agents to burn tokens and build a digital twin model of the manufacturing process, aiming to optimize details critical to volume production solutions.
“strangely enough, that's that's what I'm spending my nights and my weekends on right now is is, uh, burning a lot of coding agents tokens to build a, uh, you know, a digital twin model of all these things.”
Mark Wade · Hear it at 21:18
companies scaling up
Other shows on the same ground, closest first.
Dr. Tom Mader, COO of OpenLight, discusses his career path from internships at Apple and Hughes to founding the Light Peak project at Intel, which evolved into the Thunderbolt interface. He explains OpenLight's business model as an Arm-like IP provider for silicon photonics, offering a Process Design Kit (PDK) that integrates InP lasers and amplifiers onto silicon wafers via molecular bonding. Mader details the technical challenges of designing integrated lasers, the shift from copper to optical interconnects in data centers and LiDAR, and the importance of EDA tools for photonic design.
Steve Klinger, VP of Product at LightMatter, explains how the company uses silicon photonics to solve the interconnect bandwidth bottleneck in AI data centers. He details LightMatter's flagship product, Passage, a programmable optical fabric that acts as an active interposer to connect chiplets and ASICs with high density and low power. Klinger also discusses Envis, LightMatter's photonic AI accelerator, which performs matrix-vector multiplication using light, and shares insights on the company's growth from MIT research to a VC-funded scaling phase.
Nitin Dhar of EE Times discusses AMS's acquisition of Osram, a move designed to diversify revenue away from Apple and boost automotive sensor and photonics capabilities. Andrew Feldman, CEO of Cerebras, unveils the Wafer Scale Engine, a massive AI processor with over 400,000 cores that aims to replace thousands of NVIDIA GPUs with significantly lower power consumption. Meanwhile, Echo Chao of ESM China examines the 'smart water bottle' market, highlighting IoT features like Wi-Fi and displays that gamify hydration for children, though critics note the devices are often impractical and potentially unsafe due to plastic construction.
Brian Santo and Junko Yoshida discuss three major developments in the tech industry: the launch of Nuvia, a startup founded by former Apple and Google chip architects aiming to challenge Intel's data center dominance with a new System-on-Chip; Sony's creation of an independent AI research hub focused on gaming, sensors, and robotics; and China's announcement of its $28 billion Big Fund Phase 2 to build a self-sufficient semiconductor supply chain. The hosts analyze the feasibility of Nuvia's ambitious goals, Sony's strategic pivot in AI, and the long-term implications of China's state-backed semiconductor investments.
Peter Clark, the editor behind EE Times' Silicon 100 list, discusses the 2021 edition with host Brian Santo, highlighting a shift toward niche AI, LiDAR, and power technologies. They analyze the 'peak AI' phenomenon where many startups compete for dominance in data center and edge markets, and the rise of Chinese startups recruiting Silicon Valley talent to challenge US firms like AMD and NVIDIA. The conversation also covers the impact of SPACs on the startup definition, the maturation of the hardware investment cycle, and the emerging potential of quantum computing.
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