Wireless communications startup Taara Connect Inc., a spinout from X, Google LLC’s Moonshot Factory, today unveiled Taara Photonics, a wireless communication platform based on optical phased arrays and Taara Beam, its first product based on its photonic core.

Pitched by the company as being a breakthrough approach to commercial communications and connectivity infrastructure, the technology moves the core functionality of high-speed wireless optical communication into an integrated circuit that controls light electronically. Doing so allows networks to be deployed in hours, scaled more flexibly and improved over time without the constraints of trenching fiber or securing scarce spectrum.

Taara’s optical phased arrays were developed at X and Taara Labs over the past several years, with Taara Beam being the first product built on the photonic platform.

Tarra Beam delivers up to 25 Gbps of high-speed and low-latency connectivity over distances up to 10 kilometers in a compact, deployable form factor. The service brings fiber-like speeds to environments where traditional infrastructure is too slow, costly, or impractical to build, marking a shift from fixed, physical networks to infrastructure that can evolve at the pace of demand.

“Every generation of connectivity has been defined by a physical constraint – copper’s speed, fiber’s time to deploy and the scarcity of radio spectrum,” explains Mahesh Krishnaswamy, founder and chief executive officer of Taara. “With light transmitted through the air, those constraints begin to disappear.”

Optical systems, where beams of light are used to share data, are not a new concept, but Taara’s tech takes a different approach, shifting from mechanical control to increasingly solid-state control of light. The company’s offering uses an integrated photonic module containing more than a thousand miniature light emitters arranged in an optical phased array that allows Taara Beam to track, shape and steer light with greater precision.

The result, according to Taara, improves reliability and latency while significantly reducing size and mechanical complexity.

The new offering also builds on Taara’s existing Lightbridge product, which is deployed in more than 20 countries by operators including Bharti Airtel Ltd., Digicel Group Ltd., T-Mobile US Inc., SoftBank Group Corp. and Liquid Intelligent Technologies Holdings Ltd. Taara Beam is designed as next-generation offering phase by shrinking wireless optics technology into a shoebox sized form factor

Beam increases network density and flexibility and enables high-throughput, low-latency connectivity across urban environments, enterprise campuses, data center clusters and event venues without the delays and costs associated with building physical infrastructure.

Taara Beam can be deployed on rooftops, poles, or existing structures in hours, forming high-bandwidth mesh networks that support applications ranging from small-cell backhaul mounted on street furniture to fronthaul networks and AI-driven, real-time systems.

Taara is venture capital funded, but the amount the company raised when it was spun out from Google X in March 2025 was not disclosed. Investors include Series X Capital, with Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company, maintaining a minority stake.

Photo: Taara