Wave Issue 0301 1/17/03 Article 4-03

***XFP Releases Preliminary Spec for Ultra Small 10 Gb/s Module
(January 15)

The 10-Gigabit Small Form-factor Pluggable (XFP) Module Group, a
module Multi Source Agreement (MSA) association, announced today
that the XFP specification is available for final public review.
This specification is intended to help speed development of
multi-sourced, application transparent, ultra-small form factor
10 Gigabit per Second (Gb/s) modules, designed to occupy one
fifth the space and use one-half the power of current modules.
The specification is complete and available on the XFP MSA Web
site, and is scheduled for final adoption in February.

Modules built to the XFP specification feature an electrical
interface called XFI, which is designed to remove the complexity
and power associated with placing electrical transceivers inside
other available modules. The small size of XFP modules is
intended to enable the development of boards having up to sixteen
10 Gb/s ports to be deployed in a 19-inch rack space, with a cost
structure that will help accelerate the deployment of inexpensive
10 Gb/s client interfaces. The XFP group believes that additional
cost benefits can be achieved as higher levels of circuit
integration become available at the 10 Gb/s data rate. Because
the XFP specification is not protocol dependent, multiple market
segments will benefit from the aggregate volume of XFP modules.

The XFP Group is composed of networking, system, optical module,
semiconductor, and connector companies from the
telecommunications, data communications, and storage area network
market segments. Founded in March 2002, the Group is an industry
association dedicated to technology and standards development for
ultra-small form factor, 10 Gb/s communications modules for
telecommunications and data communications.

www.xfpmsa.org