POET Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:POET) shares rose 2.3% in premarket trading Tuesday after the company announced a strategic collaboration with Quantum Computing Inc. (NASDAQ:QUBT) to jointly develop next-generation optical engines designed to power high-speed AI network infrastructure.

The partnership will focus on creating 400G/Lane thin-film lithium niobate (TFLN) modulator-based 3.2Tbps optical engines, which would double the speed of today’s fastest networking technologies. POET will fund the development of the 400G/Lane modulator, with completion expected in the second half of 2026.

Under the agreement, QCi will integrate its high-performance 400G/Lane modulators into POET’s Optical Interposer platform, a key technology that enables compact, scalable, and efficient photonic integration. The resulting solution is expected to deliver data transfer speeds of 3.2Tbps and beyond, addressing the rapidly growing bandwidth needs of AI systems and hyperscale data centers.

“The work we are doing with QCi is among the efforts that keep POET at the forefront of AI connectivity development,” said Dr. Suresh Venkatesan, POET’s Executive Chairman and CEO. “A 400G/Lane optical modulator that incorporates TFLN will be a radical step forward for the industry.”

Dr. Yong Meng Sua, QCi’s Chief Technology Officer, added that “achieving a commercially viable optical modulator operating at 400G/Lane requires an integration platform like POET’s Optical Interposer.”

According to LightCounting Research, the global market for 3.2T optical engines, including both pluggable and co-packaged optics (CPO), is projected to reach nearly $12 billion by 2030, underscoring the strong commercial potential for this collaboration.

Poet Technologies stock price

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