Boosting copper’s reach in the data centre

Marvell has unveiled a chip that enables copper cables to send 1.6 terabits-per-second (Tbps) of data between equipment in the data centre. 

Copper cabling, also referred to as direct attach copper, is the standard interconnect used to connect compute nodes in a server, and between servers when building larger computing systems. 

Venu Balasubramonian

Data centre operators prefer to use passive copper cables. A copper cable costs less than an optical cable, a critical consideration when tens of thousands may be used in a large data centre.

Compute servers using the latest processors and AI accelerator chips have increasing input-output (I/O) requirements. This is causing interface speeds between servers, and between servers and switches, to keep doubling—from 400 gigabits to 800 gigabits and soon 1.6Tbps.

Moreoever, with each speed hike, the copper cable’s reach shrinks. A copper cable sending 25 gigabits of data has a reache of 7m, but it is only 2m at 100Gbps and is only 1m at 200Gbps.

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The OIF's coherent optics work gets a ZR+ rating

The OIF has started work on a 1600ZR+ standard to enable the sending of 1.6 terabits of data across hundreds of kilometres of optical fibre. 

The initiative follows the OIF's announcement last September that it had kicked off 1600ZR. ZR refers to an extended reach standard, sending 1.6 terabits over an 80-120km point-to-point link. 

1600ZR follows the OIF's previous work standardising the 400-gigabit 400ZR and the 800-gigabit 800ZR coherent pluggable optics.      

The decision to address a 'ZR+' standard is a first for the OIF. Until now, only the OpenZR+ Multi-Source Agreement (MSA) and the OpenROADM MSA developed interoperable ZR+ optics.

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Marvell kickstarts the 800G coherent pluggable era

Marvell has become the first company to provide an 800-gigabit coherent digital signal processor (DSP) for use in pluggable optical modules.

The 5nm CMOS Orion chip supports a symbol rate of over 130 gigabaud (GBd), more than double that of the coherent DSPs for the OIF's 400ZR standard and 400ZR+.

Meanwhile, a CFP2-DCO pluggable module using the Orion can transmit a 400-gigabit data payload over 2,000km using the quadrature phase-shift keying (QPSK) modulation scheme.

The Orion DSP announcement is timely, given how this year will be the first when coherent pluggables exceed embedded coherent module port shipments.

This is the year coherent pluggable modules exceed embedded coherent port shipments. Source: LightCounting

"We strongly believe that pluggable coherent modules will cover most network use cases, including carrier and cloud data centre interconnect," says Samuel Liu, senior director of coherent DSP marketing at Marvell.

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ECOC 2023 industry reflections - Part 3

Gazettabyte is asking industry figures for their thoughts after attending the recent ECOC show in Glasgow. In particular, what developments and trends they noted, what they learned and what, if anything, surprised them. Here are responses from Coherent, Ciena, Marvell, Pilot Photonics, and Broadcom.

Near the River Clyde in Glasgow, where ECOC was held, was once the shipbuilding centre of the world.

Julie Eng, CTO of Coherent

It had been several years since I'd been to ECOC. Because of my background in the industry, with the majority of my career in data communications, I was pleasantly surprised to see that ECOC had transitioned from primarily telecommunications, and largely academic, into more industry participation, a much bigger exhibition, and a focus on datacom and telecom. There were many exciting talks and demos, but I don't think there were too many surprises.

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Marvell’s CTO: peering into the future is getting harder

CTO interviews part 4: Noam Mizrahi

In a wide-ranging interview, Noam Mizrahi (pictured), executive vice president and corporate chief technology officer (CTO) at Marvell, discusses the many technologies needed to succeed in the data centre. He also discusses a CTO’s role and the importance of his focussed thinking ritual.

Noam Mizrahi has found his calling.

“I’m inspired by technology,” he says. “Every time I see an elegant technical solution - and it can be very simple - it makes me smile.”

Marvell hosts an innovation contest, and at one event, Mizrahi mentioned this to participants. “So they issued stickers saying, ‘I made Noam smile’,” he says.

Marvell’s broad portfolio of products spans high-end processors, automotive Ethernet, storage, and optical modules.

“This technology richness means that every day I come to work, I feel I learn something new,” he says.

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Marvell plans for CXL's introduction in the data centre

The open interconnect Compute Express Link (CXL) standard promises to change how data centre computing is architected.

CXL enables the rearrangement of processors (CPUs), accelerator chips, and memory within computer servers to boost efficiency.

Thad Omura

"CXL is such an important technology that is in high focus today by all the major cloud hyperscalers and system OEMs," says Thad Omura, vice president of flash marketing at Marvell. 

Semiconductor firm Marvell has strengthened its CXL expertise by acquiring Tanzanite Silicon Solutions. 

Tanzanite was the first company to show two CPUs sharing common memory using a CXL 2.0 controller implemented using a field-programmable gate array (FPGA). 

Marvell intends to use CXL across its portfolio of products.

Terms of the deal for the 40-staff Tanzanite acquisition have not been disclosed. 

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Vodafone's effort to get silicon for telco

This as an exciting time for semiconductors, says Santiago Tenorio, which is why his company, Vodafone, wants to exploit this period to benefit the radio access network (RAN), the most costly part of the wireless network for telecom operators.

The telecom operators want greater choice when buying RAN equipment.

Santiago Tenorio

As Tenorio, a Vodafone Fellow (the company’s first) and its network architecture director, notes, there were more than ten wireless RAN equipment vendors 15 years ago. Now, in some parts of the world, the choice is down to two.

“We were looking for more choice and that is how [the] Open RAN [initiative] started,” says Tenorio. “We are making a lot of progress on that and creating new options.”

But having more equipment suppliers is not all: the choice of silicon inside the equipment is also limited.

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