Marvell Unveils Industry-First 2nm Optical Technologies for AI Data Centers
Marvell announced the industry's first 2nm optical technologies designed for AI data center infrastructure at ECOC 2026. The lineup includes a 2nm 400G/lane PAM4 optical DSP, 1.6T ZR optics, and next-generation 200G/lane Co-Packaged Optics (CPO) technology. As AI workloads scale data center architectures from 1.6T to 3.2T and beyond, energy efficiency and interconnect bandwidth have become primary bottlenecks. Migrating optical DSPs to a 2nm node enables significantly higher throughput and lower power consumption for AI scale-out and interconnects. The showcase highlights 38 advanced demonstrations, including live 2nm 800G ZR/ZR+ with MACsec security and coherent lightweight O-band technology. These advancements allow optical components to achieve higher signal speeds while improving energy efficiency across vertical and horizontal AI fabrics.
## BACKGROUND
Modern high-speed data interconnects rely on PAM4 signaling to double data rates compared to traditional NRZ schemes. Co-Packaged Optics (CPO) places optical engines and switch ASICs on the same substrate to reduce power consumption and electrical loss, while ZR transceivers handle high-capacity coherent optical transport over longer distances.