Seven leading networking organisations have formed an group – the CDFP MSA – dedicated to defining specifications and promoting adoption of interoperable 400 Gbps hot pluggable modules.
The consortium says its joint efforts will increase customer choice, reduce end-user costs and ensure interoperability to allow the copper cable and fiber optics transceiver market to expand more rapidly.
The CDFP MSA participants are mutually committed to address industry needs by advancing technologies and providing products that are mechanically and electrically interchangeable. The consortium project scope will be to specify electrical interfaces, mechanical interfaces, and software interfaces, which may include optical connector and mating fibre optic cable plug, electrical connector, guide rail, front panel and host PCB layout requirements.
Additionally, the CDFP MSA specification is expected to include thermal, electromagnetic and electrostatic discharge design recommendations, all significant factors when creating standards. Founding members of the CDFP MSA include: Avago Technologies, Brocade, IBM, JDSU, Juniper Networks, Molex Incorporated and TE Connectivity.
Jeffery Maki, engineer at Juniper Networks, said: 'The formation of the CDFP MSA will advance 400 Gbps interconnect standards alignment in the networking industry across the vendor base and end users.
'By creating a common electro-mechanical definition, we will enable the networking industry to cost effectively adopt copper cabling and active optical cable (AOC) technology that can be used across all conforming switching and routing platforms.'