(Credit: Alphabet/Taara)
A project from Google’s parent company, Alphabet, is debuting a new chip that promises to deliver gigabit internet speeds over the air — no cable needed.
The technology comes from Taara, which has been using light beams to deliver high-speed internet without relying on traditional optical fiber. Instead, the team created equipment that can sit on a cell tower and beam light signals through the air, transmitting 20 gigabits per second to another receiver as far as 20 kilometers away.
The Taara project has since developed a way to condense the equipment, making it easier to install while also reducing the complexity. “We've taken most of the core functionality of the Taara Lightbridge—which is the size of a traffic light—and shrunken it down to the size of a fingernail,” Taara General Manager Mahesh Krishnaswamy wrote in a blog post.
(Credit: Taara)The resulting “silicon photonic chip” still uses light to beam internet data through the air. But it now uses software to “to steer, track, and correct the beam of light” through hundreds of tiny light emitters embedded on the processor. In contrast, the original system relied on physical hardware, such as mirrors and sensors, to optimize the beams.
“In tests at the Moonshot Factory labs, our team has successfully transmitted data at 10 Gbps (gigabits per second) over distances of 1 kilometer outdoors using two Taara chips. We believe this is the first time silicon photonics chips have transmitted such high-capacity data outdoors at this distance,” the blog post adds.
(Credit: Taara)The Taara team views the technology as a promising way to expand high-speed internet in underserved areas, without needing to lay expensive optical fiber. “These units can be installed in hours instead of the days, months, or even years it can take to lay fiber,” Krishnaswamy wrote.
The team also told Wired that Taara could rival SpaceX’s Starlink, which harnesses orbiting satellites and radio waves to beam high-speed internet to users on the ground. The problem is that Starlink's capacity can struggle if it's oversubscribed in populated areas.
“We can offer 10, if not 100 times more bandwidth to an end user than a typical Starlink antenna, and do it for a fraction of the cost,” Krishnaswamy told Wired.
That said, the technology does face some challenges. For example, bad weather from fog, rain and even flying birds can all potentially disrupt Taara’s equipment from beaming the high-speed internet data. But the Taara team has been coming up with mitigations, according to Wired.
Expect the next-generation Taara chip to launch sometime next year. But a lot remains unclear, including its cost and where and how the technology will be deployed. In the meantime, the Taara team is working to extend the range and capacity of the photonic chips with a new model that’ll boast thousands of emitters on the silicon. As part of Taara's development, the project has already deployed its optical communication links in more than a dozen countries.