Pilot Photonics, the Irish integrated lasers firm, has announced a partnership with Finchetto, the company developing the world’s first fully optical passive network switch for energy-efficient AI, that will see the deployment of Pilot’s line of nanosecond tunable lasers in the development of Finchetto’s next-generation switch devices for data centres. Finchetto’s fully optical and passive network switch dramatically reduces data network power consumption and latency, with significantly improved network throughput, key features for future cloud and AI data centre scaling and efficiency.
“The tunable laser is critical to switching at the packet level, and until now, we haven’t been able to find a faster laser on the market,” said Mark Rushworth, CEO and co-founder of Finchetto. “The implementation of Pilot’s technology is an important step towards delivering our fully optical and passive network switching.”
Finchetto has successfully demonstrated its optical switching approach using Pilot’s lasers and is now designing it into its next generation of demonstrators. The Pilot and Finchetto development teams are working closely together to realise the full potential of the innovative new system.
“Our laser capabilities coupled with Finchetto’s exciting roadmap for fully optical passive network switching make for a great match,” said Frank Smyth, CTO of Pilot Photonics. “We’re delighted to be working together on this project.”
Pilot Photonics will be attending OFC 2026 in Los Angeles, California, March 17 to 19, to demonstrate its laser capabilities.
