This study explores an alternative approach to fabricate the 850 nm SiOx-planarized ring-shape vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) with stable lasing emission and high-speed operation. The fabricated ring-shape VCSELs have an inner oxide diameter of 9 mu m and an outer oxide diameter of 15 mu m. These devices show a threshold current of 3.65 mA, a maximum light output power of 7.5 mW at 25 mA, and a differential resistance of 65 Omega at room temperature. Furthermore, they exhibit a stable dual-mode behavior over the operation current of 25 mA. Moreover, this TO-packaged 850 nm VCSEL for small-signal analyses shows a maximum modulation frequency of about 8 GHz, which is corresponding to a modulation-current efficiency factor of 2.47 GHz/mA(1/2). This VCSEL also shows a clear and symmetric eye-opening feature at 10.3 Gbytes/s and 18 mA for back-to-back and 66 m transmission tests. Based on these results, the excellent high-speed performance can be fulfilled by the SiOx-planarized and TO-packaged oxide-confined VCSELs with ring-shape geometry. (C) 2009 American Vacuum Society. [DOI: 10.1116/1.3072514]