The OIF co-packaging framework gives near-package optics a structural boundary: a packaged ASIC and an engine, socketed to a common substrate so they can be attached and removed for assembly and rework. NPOTEC lists sockets as one product family inside that structure.
Naming this plan is not the same as listing a socket that can be ordered, and it is not proof of manufacturing or supply. The image is a conceptual product image.
Conceptual product image
A conceptual product image for brand presentation, not a photograph of a shipping product.
筹备中 · In preparation规划方向 · Planned scope
Substrates, redistribution, and sockets
The framework defines co-packaging as attaching optical or electrical communications devices on the same first-level substrate as the host ASIC. It then names another arrangement: a packaged ASIC (die plus ASIC substrate or redistribution layer) and an engine, attached to a common substrate with sockets so they can be fitted and removed during assembly and rework. The document calls that arrangement socketed near-package optics.
What changes between designs The same section also describes solder attach with a ball grid or copper pillars. A socket needs a retention mechanism and uses area, while allowing rework; solder can reach a higher density, with a different rework and yield cost when many engines are integrated. The document sets the two side by side and does not declare either one the only method outside NPO. The 2018 XSR project note also says multiple chips would sit on a common organic package substrate. That is a statement about that project, not a claim that every near-package build uses the same organic substrate.
This is the structural boundary the framework gives NPO: a common substrate, a packaged ASIC, an engine, and sockets for assembly and rework. NPOTEC uses that assembly relationship as the center of the module plan, so the surrounding materials and devices have a place to sit. It is not a socket that can be ordered.
What changes between designs Retention can be per socket, and the document also mentions shared bolts to cut overhead. Solder reflow remains on the same comparison table for other co-packaged arrangements. In this document, the name near-package optics refers to the socketed arrangement.
If an engine is socketed on the co-packaged assembly, it needs mechanical compression. The usual sketch is bolts at the four corners of the socket; several sockets can share that hardware and trade a little overhead for density. One published reason for an external laser is to separate the laser’s thermal environment from the ASIC.
What changes between designs The framework’s application table lists air cooling and liquid cooling, and internal and external lasers, as parallel attributes. It does not assign one cell to near-package optics. ELSFP places a replaceable source at the faceplate for systems that choose an external laser. It is not a part in every assembly.
