Nubis Communications, Inc, a provider of low-latency high-density optical (HDI/O) interconnect, and Alphawave Semi, a global leader in high-speed connectivity and computing silicon for the world’s technology infrastructure, announced its upcoming demonstration of PCI Express 6.0 technology on an optical link at 64GT/s per lane. Data center providers are exploring the use of PCIe over optics to greatly expand interconnect range and flexibility for memory, CPUs, GPUs, and custom silicon accelerators to enable more scalable and power-efficient clusters for Artificial Intelligence architectures. and Machine Learning (AI/ML).
Nubis Communications and Alphawave Semi will demonstrate live at the Tektronix booth at DesignCon, the premier conference for advanced chip, board and system design technologies. An Alphawave Semi PCIe subsystem with PiCORE Controller IP and PHY PipeCORE will directly drive and receive PCIe 6.0 traffic through a Nubis XT1600 linear optical engine to demonstrate a PCIe 6.0 optical connection at 64GT/s over fiber, with the optical output measured on a Tektronix sampling scope with a high-speed optical probe.
Optical transmission technology can be leveraged to greatly increase link distances with the same bandwidths compared to copper cables, supporting larger cluster sizes needed to support increasingly larger AI/ML servers distributed across multiple nodes and enabling innovation in new disaggregated network architectures. The Nubis XT1600 optical engine supports up to 16 lanes of high-density PCIe Gen 6.0 optical connectivity or 100 Gbps/lane Ethernet without incorporating retimers.
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“Our high level of integration with 16 full-duplex lanes in a single low-power, low-latency optical engine is an excellent match with the maximum bandwidth of PCIe x16 for next-generation compute and storage implementations,” he said. Scott Schube, Vice President of Marketing at Nubis Communications. “Our demonstration of the Nubis XT1600 linear optical engine and Alphawave Semi’s PCIe 6.0 Controller and PHY IP shows the feasibility of a PCIe® 6.0 x8 link over optical fiber at 64 GT/s.”
“AI applications are reshaping data center networks, with hyperscalers deploying increasingly larger clusters of disaggregated servers distributed over greater distances. This shift has generated increased interest in PCIe over optics among several of our customers,” said Tony Chan Carusone, Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at Alphawave Semi. “Through our collaboration with Nubis, we are pleased to demonstrate how we are leveraging Alphawave Semi’s leadership in IP and connectivity silicon to enable PCIe optical connectivity solutions that accelerate high-performance AI computing and data infrastructure .”
Alphawave Semi is a global leader in high-speed connectivity and computing silicon for the world’s technology infrastructure. Faced with exponential data growth, Alphawave Semi’s technology meets a critical need: allowing data to travel faster, more reliably, with greater performance and lower energy consumption. We are a vertically integrated semiconductor company, and our IP, custom silicon and connectivity products are deployed by blue-chip global customers in data centers, computing, networking, AI, 5G, autonomous vehicles and storage. Founded in 2017 by an expert technical team with a proven track record in semiconductor IP licensing, our mission is to accelerate the critical data infrastructure at the heart of our digital world.
SOURCE: Businesswire