Jim Bell meets Sumitomo Electric at Seattle.

I am driving to Seattle today to meet executives from Sumitomo Electric. https://global-sei.com/ They are one of the major manufacturers of optical waveguides. (fiber optics). https://global-sei.com/products/optical-fiber/

Sumitomo Electric has the distinction of having achieved the world record for optical waveguide loss, currently about 0.1419 dB/kilometer at 1560 nanometers. (This is apparently a laboratory result, not production.) https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=8267035

It beats one of its biggest competitors, Corning https://www.corning.com/worldwide/en/products/communication-networks/products/fiber/optical-fiber-resource-center/fiber-matters-videos-and-tutorials.html primarily because Sumitomo employs a pure-silica fiber core, with a fluorine-doped cladding, whereas Corning has long employed a pure-silica cladding, with the core doped with germanium. One of Sumitomo's fibers, Z+150 has a production loss of 0.152 dB/km

One of Corning's fibers, has a specified loss of less than 0.17 dB/km at 1550 nanometers wavelength. (A production result, not laboratory.)

Into this 30 year+ competition I come, like a veritable bull in the technical china-shop. I got the attention of Sumitomo by using LinkedIn to send about 100 of their employees on Monday (as well as a couple thousand others at Corning, YOFC, OFS, Prysmian, ZTT, Hengtong, Nokia, Fujikura, Furukawa, Futong, Fiberhome, Ciena, Huawei Marine, and SubCom) a statement:

"Your company should be selling a silica single-mode optical waveguide with a loss of 0.001 dB/kilometer. You'll think that's impossible but I know how to do it.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/optical-waveguide-0001-dbkm-loss-even-10x-less-jim-bell https://daltonium.com/optical-fiber/

(What I have not yet mentioned is my belief that rather than the usual silica-fiber transmission "sweet spot" being about 1500-1600 nanometers, useful transmission will likely occur from 600-2000+ nanometer wavelength. This will keep fiber transmitter and receiver manufacturers busy for years!)

Well, THAT got Sumitomo's attention !!! What I proposed amounted to, in their industry, a leprechaun saddled on a unicorn, itself standing on the back of a winged-pig. Flying.

Jim Bell