News: Optoelectronics
8 September 2022
OIF members showcasing interoperability for critical networking technologies at ECOC
In booth#701 during the European Conference on Optical Communication (ECOC 2022) in Basel, Switzerland (19-21 September), the Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF) is hosting the largest ever interoperability showcase, with nearly 30 member companies participating in demonstrations in four critical areas: 400ZR optics, co-packaging architectures, Common Electrical I/O (CEI) architectures and Common Management Interface Specification (CMIS) implementations.
OIF experts will also participate in the Market Focus program at ECOC, discussing its work in CMIS in one session, which defines current and future generations of management control for optical and copper modules, and a second session addressing the successful development of 400ZR optics, and OIF’s work to define 800ZR/LR.
“The high level of participation in this year’s interoperability demonstration at ECOC demonstrates the global importance of OIF’s work and the collective efforts of its members to showcase how their solutions establish an ecosystem and work together to drive implementation of next-generation capabilities,” says Mike Klempa of Alphawave IP Group, and chair of the OIF Physical & Link Layer Interoperability Working Group.
The interoperable optical networking solutions demo — live and static — at ECOC will feature 28 OIF member companies (a record number of participants): Alphawave IP; Amphenol; Applied Optoelectronics Inc; Cadence Design Systems; Ciena; Cisco; Corning; Credo; EXFO; Fujitsu Optical Components; Juniper Networks Inc; Keysight Technologies; Lumentum; Marvell; MaxLinear Inc; Microchip Technology Inc; Molex; MultiLane Inc; Nokia; O-Net Communications; Senko Advanced Components Inc; Sumitomo Electric Industries Ltd.; Synopsys Inc; TE Connectivity; US Conec; VIAVI Solutions Inc; Wilder Technologies; and Yamaichi Electronics.
400ZR demo
OIF’s 400ZR project is proving successful in facilitating new and simplified architectures for high-bandwidth inter-datacenter interconnects and promoting interoperability among coherent optical module manufacturers. This 400ZR interop demo shows a full implementation across an 80km DWDM ecosystem using multiple form-factor pluggable modules, 400GbE routers, a 75GHz C-band open line system, and test equipment solutions from multiple vendors. The demo provides evidence of widescale 400ZR deployment readiness based on a broad ecosystem of interoperable solutions.
Co-packaging demo
While individual companies consider options to optimize power and density, OIF has seen the need to lead industry standardization discussions for co-packaging architectures that promise to reduce power consumption and increase bandwidth edge density. OIF is leading the industry’s interoperability discussions for co-packaging solutions and will showcase its progress with multi-party demonstrations of its 3.2T Module project and External Laser Small Form Factor Pluggable project (ELSFP). A variety of interoperable components that enable co-packaging will be shown, along with a system implementation.
Common Electrical I/O (CEI) demo
OIF says that it played a lead role in moving the industry to the next generation by developing electrical interface specifications for 112Gbps per differential pair. Multiple live demonstrations featuring interoperability amongst 14 participating members prove the critical role that OIF serves as well as the developing supplier ecosystem. The CEI-112G demonstrations in the OIF booth will feature multi-party silicon supplier interoperability over various channels, including mated compliance boards, PCB channels, direct attach copper cable channels, a cabled backplane and even fiber. Each configuration demonstrates the technical viability of 112Gbps operation, along with multiple industry form factors, including OSFP and QSFP-DD. The demo also shows a measured far-end eye diagram on an oscilloscope with analysis to show an example of the silicon signal integrity that is typically required going through the large variety of channels on display.
OIF says that, as the industry looks forward to higher data rates and increased throughput for the next generation of systems based on 224Gbps per lane, new specifications and technologies will be required. OIF, where the optical networking industry’s interoperability work gets done, is leading the charge on 224G hardware interconnection application spaces and definitions, unveiling publicly at ECOC the first live 224G demo.
CMIS implementations demo
The Common Management Interface Specification (CMIS) is now established as the management interface of choice for next-generation pluggable modules, capable of managing both simple and advanced modules. CMIS provides a well-defined common mechanism to initialize and manage optical and copper modules while still providing the ability to support custom functionality. This commonality makes integration into different host platforms easier for both the host vendor and the module vendor. The CMIS demo consists of four separate demonstrations that show how modules can be managed and initialized, how modules can support multiple independent services (breakout) and how module firmware can be easily upgraded.
OIF @ ECOC 2022 Market Focus
20 September (4:10-4:30pm) - ‘CMIS – Management control of optical modules’ by Gary Nicholl, Cisco, OIF Physical & Link Layer Working Group Management co-vice chair, secretary/treasurer and board member.
CMIS addresses the industry’s need for commonality in managing pluggable modules, and it has been widely and successfully adopted across the industry. As the complexity of pluggable modules continues to increase and the industry continues a trend towards third-party pluggable modules, the management interface is becoming as important an interoperability interface as the electrical and optical interfaces (where the OIF has been actively involved for many years). This session provides a high-level overview of CMIS, explains the reasons why the effort was transferred to the OIF, discusses the current status of CMIS within the OIF and highlights some of the new CMIS features that the OIF will be working on during the upcoming year, such as adding support for co-packaging/External Laser Small Form Factor Pluggable (ELSFP) projects and electrical link training.
21 September (12-12:25pm) - ‘Deployment of 400ZR and the ongoing OIF work to define 800ZR/LR’ by Karl Gass, OIF Physical & Link Layer Working Group Optical vice chair.
400ZR coherent deployment is underway, showing that a strong ecosystem already exists for this new interoperable standard developed by the OIF. In this presentation, an OIF expert will give an overview of 400ZR and discuss its deployment status, including continued optimization. The presentation then gives an overview of current 800ZR and 800LR technical work to create the next core network architecture components and bring coherent networking into the data center.
