This article takes a closer look at Taara Beam, a wireless optical communication system from Taara. The company spun out of Google’s Moonshot Factory and struck out on its own in 2025.
Taara Beam pushes up to 25 Gbps through the air with near-infrared light. That means it can deliver high-bandwidth backhaul and fronthaul without the hassle of laying fiber.
They’ve packed some very advanced photonics into a compact hardware platform. It’s meant for places where fiber is just too slow or complicated, whether that’s a dense city or a pop-up network for an event.
Taara Beam: A Wireless Optical Link for the Real World
Taara Beam relies on free-space optical links. It uses the same wavelengths as fiber optics, but instead of glass, the signals travel through open air.
The system supports two-way links up to ten kilometers. All of this fits in a box about the size of a shoebox, which is pretty wild.
You can set it up on rooftops, masts, or even light poles—no digging, no spectrum licenses, no fighting for permits. The idea is to get dense network coverage fast, especially where running fiber would be a nightmare.
Core Technologies Behind Taara Beam
- Taara Photonics Platform: This is a compact silicon chip that handles optical communication and ditches clunky mechanical alignment for an electronic one.
- Optical Phased Array: Over 1,000 tiny light sources are controlled electronically to steer the beam, so there are no moving parts—just fast, precise tracking.
- Near-infrared, free-space links: Uses the same wavelengths as fiber, but beams them through the air for flexible, line-of-sight connections.
- Bidirectional 25 Gbps links over up to 10 km: Delivers high throughput and low latency, which is great for real-time data and AI workloads.
Form Factor and Deployment
- Shoebox-sized packaging: It’s small enough to stick on street furniture or the edge of a building. You could have it delivered and mounted in hours.
- Rapid installation: No civil works, no waiting for permits—just quick network densification.
- Infrastructure-friendly: Skips the headaches of excavation, spectrum licensing, or right-of-way talks. That really makes things simpler in cities.
- Target environments: Think urban backhaul and fronthaul, business parks, sprawling data-center campuses, or even temporary setups for events or emergencies.
Real-World Applications and Use Cases
Taara Beam is really about filling the gaps where fiber can’t keep up, especially in crowded cities, campus networks, or when you need something up fast. With its high bandwidth and low latency, it’s a solid pick for AI systems that need real-time data.
- Small-cell backhaul and fronthaul in city cellular networks—no need to dig up streets to densify coverage.
- Data-center campus links, where you might need to reconfigure or scale things quickly.
- Pop-up networks for events, disaster response, or emergency ops—sometimes you just need it working yesterday.
- AI and high-frequency trading setups that can’t wait for data to crawl through old-school networks.
Evolution from Lightbridge to Beam
Taara Beam builds on what they learned from the old Lightbridge system. Lightbridge mostly connected hard-to-reach places—rivers, mountains, dense city gaps.
Beam is more about packing a ton of capacity into existing infrastructure and making network deployment flexible. It’s aimed at places where fiber just can’t expand fast enough, or maybe never will.
Investment, Partnerships, and Global Reach
Taara has attracted venture funding, including Series X Capital. Alphabet still holds a minority stake.
The company has rolled out Lightbridge in more than 20 countries. Partners include T-Mobile, SoftBank, Airtel, and Digicel.
Taara Beam wants to strengthen these partnerships. They offer a scalable, fiber-like capacity that networks can add quickly, skipping the usual civil-engineering headaches.
Here is the source article for this story: Google spin-off develops optical alternative to fiber optics