Welcome to Terabit Speed
Laser communication is blazing-fast. It can transmit huge amounts of data in fractions of a second and easily outperforms RF technology. The current world records for long distance wireless communication with millimeter wave technology and in the optical domain are a clear illustration of this. The current records achieved a data rate that was over 320 times higher for laser communication and these advances will only grow larger in the future.
In the Blink of an Eye
You know when you are sitting there waiting an age for Netflix to stop buffering and start again so you can see how Casablanca finishes because your broadband connection has been playing up a lot lately? Or when you go to your best friend’s wedding in the middle of nowhere and can’t access Facebook to post an embarrassing picture or video of the bride and groom because you can’t get any 3G signal? Well, laser communication puts a stop to all that.
| Data | Size | Time to transmit* | Typical scenario |
| Audio Podcast | 5 MB | 0.004 s | Listening to a travel podcast while cruising on the Amazon. |
| HD movie | 4 GB | 3.2 s | Streaming a movie during a long-distance flight. |
| Autonomous car sensor data (1h driving) | 25 GB | 20 s | Send generated data to headquarters for AI training. |
| Blueprint of human DNA | 200 GB | 160 s | Sending a copy to Mars. Just in case… |
Electromagnetic Wave (goodbye to RF...)
Laser communication allows for bandwidths inaccessible to other wireless long-distance communication technologies. Our current systems allow up to 10 Gbps and we are working on developing multiple Tbps in the future. This means no more buffering, no more dead spots in the middle of fields. Data rates like this are possible because laser communication uses an electromagnetic frequency that is many orders of magnitudes higher than what is used by RF technologies. And while RF is already reaching its technical limits laser communication is still in its infancy with a lot of potential for improvements in the future.
