Reliability of semiconductor lasers for undersea optical transmission systems

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Abstract
The reliability of laser diodes developed for undersea optical transmission systems is analyzed. Up to 1000 device samples of two types (DC-PBH and VSB) are used. An aging test with constant light power operation of 5 mW is carried out at 10, 50, and 70°C for 10 000 h. The median lifetime at 10°C is conservatively estimated to be1.6 \times 10^{6}hours. Failure rate at 10°C is estimated at 250 FIT's at 25 years of service for the wear-out failure mode and at less than 50 FIT's for the random failure mode with a sufficient margin. Furthermore, it is determined that reliability can be further improved by selection of long-life lasers through an additional third step screening aging.