Keysight Expands Photonics Design Ecosystem with GlobalFoundries PDK

Keysight announced support for GlobalFoundries’ silicon photonics process technology in its Advanced Design System Photonic Designer, expanding its foundry ecosystem for photonic integrated circuit development. Designers can move from PIC design to full electro-optical-electrical system simulation within a single environment, validating how photonic circuits perform at the optical link level before tapeout.

As silicon photonics moves into volume production across data centers, AI infrastructure, and optical communications, designing a photonic integrated circuit is only part of the challenge. Engineers need to confirm its performance within an EOE system. Traditional workflows separate these steps, forcing teams to move between PIC design tools and system simulation platforms. This introduces risk and delays validation until late in the development cycle.

Keysight’s PDK for ADS Photonic Designer addresses this by connecting PIC design with system level EOE simulation. Engineers can now design photonic circuits on GF’s platform, then validate full optical link behavior, including eye diagram analysis and signal integrity metrics such as transmission dispersion eye closure quaternary (TDECQ), without switching tools. Built on physics based models aligned to GF’s silicon photonics process, the PDK ensures that PIC simulations correlate to fabricated silicon, while validation at the system level ensures the desired channel link performance is achieved.

These PIC and system performance are critical for high-speed optical interconnect architecture development, and further down the design process where photonic and electronic performance must be verified together. Engineers designing optical transceivers and co-packaged optics can use Keysight FlexDCA oscilloscope software during design to ensure the best possible simulation to measurements correlation and the best possible predictive results.

Vikas Gupta, Senior Fellow, Silicon Photonics Product Line at GlobalFoundries, said: “As silicon photonics moves into broader deployment for AI infrastructure and high-speed optical communications, designers need workflows that connect device innovation with system-level performance from the start. By enabling our silicon photonics platform in Keysight’s ADS Photonic Designer, we’re helping customers accelerate development, reduce design risk and scale their optical interconnect solutions more effectively.”

Niels Faché, Senior Vice President, Keysight’s Design Engineering Software, said: “The silicon photonics industry has moved past the point where circuit design and system validation can live in separate workflows. Engineers building for AI and data center infrastructure need to see system-level link performance from day one, not after fabrication."

Source: Keysight media announcement