Intel's ECTC 2026 paper swaps the flexible fiber array in a detachable CPO connector for a rigid glass coupler. The point is not lower loss but turning fiber alignment from on-site craft into a process-locked, manufacturable, traceable step.

Detachable CPO optical connectors have never managed low loss, passive alignment, high-power handling and detachability all at once. At ECTC 2026, GlobalFoundries and Corning did it for the first time: <1.5 dB/facet, 280 mW, fully passive alignment — a one-two punch of foundry silicon photonics and glass connectors.