CXL is expected to enable servers to dramatically expand memory footprints and to share compute, memory and storage resources across rack and row scale installations at line rate. However, existing passive copper connectivity solutions will not scale to meet this opportunity as they are too short, too bulky and provide insufficient signal integrity for the upcoming PCIe6/CXL3.0 PAM4 64GT/s standard. The HiWire Consortium CXL Cabling workstream is intended to enable row-scale CXL connectivity with the simplicity and interoperability that HiWire Ethernet AECs are already known for.
“The HiWire Consortium was a key actor in standardizing the Ethernet AECs that much of the cloud runs on today,” said Don Barnetson, Vice President of Product at Credo and organizer of the HiWire Consortium. “Our new CXL workstream will bring this same innovation – enabling plug and play, low-cost, low latency interconnect that allows CXL to span to rack and row scale installations.”
“External connectivity solutions will be key to enhancing the full potential of Intel’s CXL enabled Xeon products,” said Jim Pappas, director of Technology Initiatives at Intel. “Intel is working as a member of the CXL and HiWire Consortium to support these standardization efforts.”
“Microsoft was a founding member of the HiWire Consortium, and early adopter of AECs because of their ease of use and interoperability within existing standards,” said Gerald Degrace, PM Head for Azure Sirius Technologies, at Microsoft and an advisor to the HiWire Consortium. “We are excited to work with HiWire Consortium on CXL standardization to achieve the same seamless interoperability for this new generation of external interconnect.”
To view the full list of HiWire Consortium members, go here.
About Credo
Our mission is to deliver high-speed solutions to break bandwidth barriers on every wired connection in the data infrastructure market. Credo is an innovator in providing secure, high-speed connectivity solutions that deliver improved power efficiency as data rates and corresponding bandwidth requirements increase exponentially throughout the data infrastructure market. Our innovations ease system bandwidth bottlenecks while simultaneously improving on power, security, and reliability. Our connectivity solutions are optimized for optical and electrical Ethernet applications, including the emerging 100G (or Gigabits per second), 200G, 400G, 800G and the emerging 1.6T (Terabits per second) port markets. Credo products are based on our proprietary Serializer/Deserializer (SerDes) and Digital Signal Processor (DSP) technologies. Our product families include Integrated Circuits (ICs) for the optical and line card markets, Active Electrical Cables (AECs) and SerDes Chiplets. Our intellectual property (IP) solutions consist primarily of SerDes IP licensing.
For more information, please visit https://www.credosemi.com. Follow Credo on LinkedIn.
