Similarities and differences between photonic and microelectronic integration technology are discussed and a vision of the development of InP-based photonic integration in the coming decade is given.

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Jeppix is the European platform that is aiming to offer access to Indium Phosphide-based technology for manufacturing of photonic integrated circuits. This is enabled by using a generic integration technology. The authors outline the current status and developments.

The imbalance and excess loss in multimode interference couplers with fabrication errors are examined. Remarkably, there exists a number of optimum access waveguide widths which give a minimum imbalance. Furthermore, quite low excess loss can be simultaneously achieved by choosing one particular optimum width. It is also shown that paired interference couplers have better imbalance performance than general interference couplers, given the same fabrication tolerances and length constraint for both coupler types. In particular, a paired interference coupler with an access waveguide width approximately 0.3 times the coupler width has the best imbalance performance. These results are obtained using a simple model and are supported by more sophisticated numerical models and experimental data from couplers fabricated in InP/InGaAsP.

In this paper, we present the design and characterization of a monolithically integrated tunable laser for optical coherence tomography in medicine. This laser is the first monolithic photonic integrated circuit containing quantum-dot amplifiers, phase modulators, and passive components. We demonstrate electro-optical tuning capabilities over 60 nm between 1685 and 1745 nm, which is the largest tuning range demonstrated for an arrayed waveguide grating controlled tunable laser. Furthermore, it demonstrates that the active-passive integration technology designed for the 1550 nm telecom wavelength region can also be used in the 1600-1800 nm region. The tunable laser has a 0.11 nm effective linewidth and an approximately 0.1 mW output power. Scanning capabilities of the laser are demonstrated in a free space Michelson interferometer setup where the laser is scanned over the 60 nm in 4000 steps with a 500 Hz scan frequency. Switching between two wavelengths within this 60 nm range is demonstrated to be possible within 500 ns.