March 13, 2006 Anaheim, CA -- At last week's OFC/NFOEC 2006, Avanex , Mitsubishi Electric, and Opnext announced formation of a multi-source agreement (MSA) to establish compatible sources of 10-Gbit/sec XFP-E (extended size) transceivers for use in high-performance optical transmission systems.
The agreement will establish internationally compatible sources of 10-Gbit/sec XFP-E transceivers designed to achieve high performance in 10-Gbit/sec transmission systems and supporting electrical and optical compatibility with XFP standard transceivers. As an extension of standard XFP MSA 4.0 compliance, the companies say the new MSA will provide flexible optical interfaces for ultra long haul 40- and 80-km DWDM applications, while supporting backward compatibility with SONET/SDH, 10-Gigabit Ethernet, and 10G Fiber Channel XFP transceivers operating from 9.95 Gbit/sec up to 11.09 Gbit/sec. The companies say the XFP-E MSA will also inject very long reach and tunable capability into the XFP transceiver standard, while supporting an extended temperature range (-40 to +85°C) and a high degree of customization owing to a spatially increased transceiver package.
The XFP-E MSA meets applicable ITU-T G.691, ITU-T G.709, Telcordia GR-253, and XFP MSA standards. MSA is now finalizing the XFP-E specifications, with working samples to be made available this year. Samples are to provide an XFI electrical interface along with a 2-wire serial I2C interface for digital diagnostics, according to the companies.