An optical apparatus comprising a reflective optical modulator and an integrated planar lightwave circuit. The circuit can have one or more pairs of input and output planar waveguides thereon. The input planar waveguide is optically coupleable to a first optical fiber and the output optical waveguide is optically coupleable to a second optical fiber. End segments of the input planar waveguide and the output planar waveguide are tilted towards each other such that the input planar waveguide is able to direct an optical signal from the planar lightwave circuit to a reflective modulator. The reflective optical modulator is configured to data modulate the optical signal and transmit said data modulated optical signal to the end segment of the output planar waveguide.