Inphi samples industry’s first coherent DSP enabling 400G pluggables

Technologies and Products

Data interconnect vendor Inphi Corporation has announced it is sampling its new Canopus™ coherent Digital Signal Processor (DSP), which it claims is the industry’s first merchant 7nm coherent DSP. Canopus provides low power and high density QSFP-DD, OSFP and CFP2-DCO coherent pluggable modules for cloud and telecom customers. Inphi says Canopus makes high density IP over DWDM on switch and router platforms a reality, and it is designed to deliver the performance required for metro and long-haul networks. For the first time, switches and routers can offer the same port density of coherent interfaces as client ports with capacities of up to 14.4 Tbps per rack unit (RU), representing a 3x increase over current coherent port densities. Coherent interfaces directly on switch and router platforms eliminate the need for dedicated cloud transport boxes for DCI networks, and consequently, reduce cost and power dissipation by more than 50%.

Canopus’ DSP architecture implements probabilistic shaping, a technique that maximises data rate at longer fibre distances and delivers lower deployment cost per bit. For the first time, coherent pluggables are powered with probabilistic shaping technology. Canopus’ low power implementation in 7nm silicon geometry delivers over 75% reduction in DSP power dissipation and size as compared to the current generation of coherent DSPs. A low power DSP is necessary to meet the small form factor pluggable modules power requirements. Additionally, Canopus’ design allows operators the flexibility to select either ZR or high-performance modes, enabling them to cover a wide range of network applications.

Canopus builds upon the extensive deployed base of Inphi’s M200 coherent DSP. This continuity enables OEMs and Operators interoperability across generations of coherent solutions for 100G and 200G deployments to drive a seamless transition to 400G. Canopus supports 400G ZR, which is broadly supported by cloud operators, service providers and OEMs and is being standardised in OIF facilitating multi-vendor interoperability up to 120km span. Inphi contributed an innovative FEC technology called CFEC, adopted by multiple standards bodies including OIF, IEEE and ITU for the 400G ZR standard. Canopus extends performance beyond ZR to ZR+ extending 400G reach and spans lower data rates to thousands of kilometres on metro and long-haul networks.

“The Canopus coherent DSP is ushering a new industry wide ecosystem, pluggability, and era of interoperability. Canopus increases density while slashing both power dissipation and the cost per bit to unprecedented levels,” said Nariman Yousefi, SVP, Coherent DSP, Inphi (pictured). “The sampling of the Canopus DSP transforms coherent pluggable optics to high-performance 100/200/300/400G, a true revolutionary step and the inflection point in the industry.”

“The market for coherent pluggable optics will exceed US$500M by 2023,” said Andrew Schmitt, directing analyst at Cignal AI. “Canopus is the first product to bring standards-based interoperability to coherent networking and enable disaggregation of high-performance optical modules in both cloud DCI and traditional service providers.”

Inphi is facilitating an ecosystem of partners offering QSFP-DD, OSFP and CFP2-DCO modules, fueled with coherent advancements enabled by Canopus power and performance scalability. This will make Canopus truly interoperable ecosystem for data center interconnect, metro and long haul applications across multiple established module vendors in the industry, will drive supply diversity and accelerate time to deployment for OEMs and operators. Canopus ecosystem partners are equipped to deploy interoperable solutions across wide array of optical network links with ZR and ZR+.

“Canopus drives an industry first in key coherent market segments,” said Marc Stiller, NeoPhotonics Vice President of Coherent Modules. “Time to market is critical in every coherent segment. Our partnership with Inphi, combined with our industry leading coherent optics platforms, allows NeoPhotonics to rapidly deliver Canopus based modules and sets us on a leadership path.”

For more information, visit www.inphi.com