HUBER+SUHNER has expanded its partnership with Microsoft Azure Fiber, alongside investment to increase production capabilities. The development is intended to support the deployment of Hollow Core Fiber (HCF) cable and connectivity solutions used in cloud and AI infrastructure.
Since 2017, the collaboration between the two organisations has supported the development and manufacture of HCF cable and connector solutions, originating from work with the Azure team in Romsey, UK. Higher-capacity variants are now in development to support plans for scaling HCF-enabled cloud infrastructure.
The partnership has resulted in a portfolio of outside plant (OSP) and inside plant (ISP) cable solutions that are certified for field deployment. Current work is focused on higher-density HCF cable designs aligned with Azure’s network requirements. At HUBER+SUHNER’s Herisau facility in Switzerland, production processes are being prepared to integrate HCF into multi-fiber loose-tube (MLT) cable formats as manufacturing scale increases.
A mode-converting HCF connector, designed for hyperscale and metro-optical environments, is also part of the development work. These connectors are produced at the Cube Optics facility in Mainz, Germany and are being manufactured as capacity expands.
The combined HCF cable and connector developments are being positioned as part of an end-to-end connectivity approach within the ongoing collaboration between HUBER+SUHNER and Microsoft Azure.