News & Insights
Industry news and practical guides covering precision optics, optical communications, fiber connectivity, optical transceivers and emerging imaging products.
Explore industry news, technical guides and product observations. Articles distinguish published developments from verified product availability; specifications, supplier qualification and delivery terms require project-specific confirmation. Internet-sourced reports identify their references.
Browse by topic
Follow optical and photonics developments, compare technologies and prepare a better-informed sourcing inquiry.
Creotech Quantum will design, build and demonstrate superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors for ground quantum-key-distribution stations and advanced laser communication under a 24-month ESA project worth €2.33 million, lifting the detector technology to TRL 5 and moving it from proof-of-concept prototype toward deployable hardware.
Read article →Artemis has merged Omega Optical — precision optical coatings — into Optikos, arguing that splitting design, fabrication, coating and testing across separate organisations has become a constraint rather than an asset. Growth capital is committed to manufacturing capacity, and infrared optics now sits inside the same workflow as thin-film coatings and metrology.
Read article →InfraTec’s new ImageIR c7300 opens the compact line of cooled infrared cameras with an MWIR long-life cooler rated at 28,000 hours average service life, a five-position filter wheel, a standard range of −10…1,500 °C extendable to 3,000 °C, and on-camera calibration data for plug-and-play integration.
Read article →Defence — drones, counter-UAS, border surveillance — is now the engine of infrared demand, while automotive slips to the right. The sourcing decision that follows is narrow: Chinese vendors are pushing 8 µm pixel pitch, Western vendors are holding 12 µm, and infrared optics are migrating from germanium to moulded chalcogenide glass.
Read article →Since 1 July 2026 every low-value parcel entering the EU carries a flat €3 duty below the €150 threshold, and 5.8 billion low-value parcels arrived in 2025, up 26%. Mainstream pet food is insulated; lightweight treats, supplements and accessories shipped direct to consumers are not.
Read article →Atlas’ new hand drops the pinky and packs 13 degrees of freedom into four fingers, with a four-DOF opposable thumb, dense fingertip and palm tactile arrays, and one encapsulated actuator type with no cables crossing the joints. Dexterous tool use is now the design target.
Read article →Huawei’s Ruiying Z10 pairs a 1-inch sensor with a 9.1–91 mm f/2.0–4.5 motorised zoom and a φ20.22 mm entry pupil at the long end — larger than a Sony RX100 VI, a Panasonic ZS110 or vivo’s 200 mm teleconverter. Detachable optics are back, and the optical bill of materials changes with them.
Read article →MIIT has written 1 million 50G-PON ports by 2030 into the 15th Five-Year Plan, against 20,000 in 2025 — a fifty-fold build. Standards are complete and the chips and modules are called mature. Cost, power and coupling yield are what stand between the plan and volume.
Read article →SiC waveguides carry a 2.6–2.7 refractive index and 50°–70° field of view in a single layer. With 12-inch DUV lines in production, AR waveguide supply is shifting from glass to silicon carbide.
Read article →Global humanoid robot shipments reached nearly 25,000 units in the first half of 2026, up 432% year on year, with China above 75%. The parts list behind each unit is where the sourcing opportunity sits.
Read article →Array glass molding has taken C-Lens collimators from process validation to ten-million-units-a-month output, with head-module customers already placing volume orders. Collimator sourcing is being re-rated.
Read article →AT&T has committed more than US$3 billion to Corning for fiber and cable through 2030, on top of a record China Mobile tender where 17 of 18 bidders hit the ceiling price. Cable pricing and lead times are the story.
Read article →Evergreen reference
Specification checklists that stay relevant regardless of news cycle.
Factory visits and supplier audits are available by appointment for qualified projects after the selected product and facility are confirmed. Share the audit purpose, document checklist and preferred dates in advance.
Include your company, product, quantity, target market and required evidence.
