Point2 Technology aims to disrupt the data center industry – one innovation at a time. Telecommunications, weather, refugees—and even unique radio technology—are changing data transmission, and they are all for the better. Nine years ago, former stars of Marvell, Nvidia, and Samsung created the company. As you can tell, they might be a bit obsessed about making data centers more energy efficient with their e-Tube cables. This all leads to much greater speed, reliability and energy efficiency with a much lowered cost.
Point 2 has manufactured new e-Tube cables that feature eight robust e-Tube fibers. Each individual fiber has the capacity to transmit more than 200 gigabits of data every second! Point2’s remarkable capacity puts it at the leading edge of data transfer technology. The company is preparing to produce the chips for a state-of-the-art 1.6-terabit-per-second oceanic cable. This cable will utilize eight slender polymer waveguides, with each waveguide carrying 448 gigabits per second at two distinct frequencies: 90 gigahertz and 225 GHz.
Advancements in Cable Technology
Point2’s e-Tube cable provides many benefits compared to copper cables. This solution has considerably less area than a 32-gauge copper cable. It delivers up to 20x the reach, further increasing compactness and efficiency for data centers. The system is extremely energy efficient — one-third the energy needed by optical systems. It is one-third the cost and gets to latency that is up to one-thousandth of what we can do through more traditional means.
Don Barnetson, another major mind behind Point2, points to the company’s focus on making data flow easier and faster with the words,
“You start with passive copper, and you do everything you can to run in passive copper as long as you can.”
We believe this approach emphasizes Point2’s overall strategy of leveraging what’s out there while looking to truly innovate the future.
The Copper Cliff and Its Implications
Point2’s innovations come at a time when data centers need them most. That urgent challenge, which David Kuo, the vice president of product marketing and business development at Calix, refers to as the “copper cliff.” This better encompasses the difficulties that legacy copper-based systems face. This means that they just don’t have the bandwidth to meet the skyrocketing demand for data transmission. Kuo is adamant that meeting this challenge will take a major paradigm shift in the way that data centers develop connectivity and efficiency.
David Kuo, CEO of Anaiya, explains that Point2’s technology has the potential to greatly reduce the capital and operational expenses related to scaling up performance in data centers. He remarks,
“If I didn’t have to be at [an optical wavelength], where should I be?”
This question is part of a larger mindset shift among some engineers, who want to move as much data as possible without being chained to traditional optical wavelengths.
Customer Perspectives and Market Positioning
It’s this fresh attitude and perspective that has gained Point2 Technology recognition from customers looking for a better way. As David Kuo of II‐A suggested, while the customers love the fiber technology, they tend to tell them to be more happy with the photonics. He backs up this idea by citing activist Dave Welch, who claims,
“Customers love fiber. But what they hate is the photonics.”
Welch convincingly argues that electronics are fundamentally more reliable than optical systems. This strong corroborating evidence is what makes Point2’s commitment to radio transmission technologies so exciting.
It’s an impressive feat for the company, which has raised a total of $55 million in venture funding to date. Heavy hitters such as Molex, one of the world’s largest producers of computer cables and connections, invested heavily. This financial backing not only underscores investor confidence in Point2’s vision but positions it competitively within the rapidly evolving tech landscape.