DATA CENTRE STRATEGY
A new approach to moving data Paolo Costa, Partner Research Manager at Microsoft and lead researcher on the project, describes the core principle in terms that make the physics intuitive. Laser-based fibre delivers data in pulses across a small number of channels – what Paolo calls the“ narrow and fast” approach. The MicroLED system, by contrast, uses thousands of independent channels to transmit data in patterns comparable to QR codes. The“ wide and slow” approach, as Paolo characterises it, carries equivalent data volumes across a broader front, analogous to a wide, slow river moving the same water as a narrow, fast stream.
The imaging fibre that makes this possible had an unlikely origin.“ Imaging fibre looks like a standard fibre, but inside it has thousands of cores,” says Paolo.“ That was the missing piece. We finally had a way to carry thousands of parallel channels in one cable.” The technology extends the reach of MicroLED links to tens of metres, bridging the gap between copper’ s short-range precision and the longer but more temperamental reach of laser-based fibre.
The project reached a significant milestone when Microsoft completed a proof of concept with MediaTek and other suppliers to miniaturise the system into a transceiver compatible with existing data centre equipment. That device – roughly the size of a large thumb – contains lenses, photodiodes and signal processing hardware that would have occupied a full laboratory bench only a few years ago.
76 June 2026