Editor: Linley
Gwennap In This Issue
The new edition of A Guide to Communications Processors will soon be available. Get up to speed on the flexible yet inexpensive devices supporting the diverse requirements of modern CPE appliances. Order by July 29 and get a prepublication discount. For more information, visit our web site. On Monday, AMCC announced two new members of the nP37x0 family. The nP3740 and nP3750 derive from the nP3700 and nP3710 and are for access-system designs with moderate traffic-management requirements. Unlike the substantially similar nP3700/nP3710, the 3740/3750 do not have an out-of-band interface parallel with the line-side data interface to provide additional information that maps data to channels. Consequently, the new parts are best suited to metro and access systems--such as voice gateways, metro Ethernet systems, and access platforms--in which up to 5Gbps of traffic needs to be processed, but the traffic does not map to thousands of channels. As less capable parts, the 3740/3750 will be priced below that of the 3700/3710. However, the extra capability enabled by the out-of-band interface is inextricably tied to the Mission chipset to which the 3700/3710 belong, along with a framer and ATM/HDLC controller. Thus, when used independently, the 3700/3710 offer no more value than the 3740/3750, and AMCC is at risk of the new parts undermining the value of the more capable, older parts. On the other hand, the 3740/n750 will not appeal to customers seeking a successor to the old nP345x--AMCC's current offering for metro Ethernet systems--if priced too high. This situation will be compounded when AMCC releases the nP3705. It has less processing power and bandwidth than the 3740/3750 but support for deeper channelization when used with its associated chip set. While this proliferation of products could create confusion in the short term, in the long run AMCC is better positioned in the access and metro markets. —Joe Coverage
of AMCC's nP37x0 appears in our report A
Guide to Network Processors. Last week, Alacritech announced it had settled its suit against Microsoft regarding that company's TCP Chimney technology, due to be released in 1Q06 as part of the Scalable Networking Pack for Windows Server 2003 and later as part of the Longhorn release of Windows. As part of the settlement, Microsoft receives a license to Alacritech patents, removing a legal roadblock that had prevented the development and distribution of Microsoft's TCP offload technology. At the same time, Broadcom also took a license to Alacritech's patents, legitimizing Broadcom's CNIC product. In exchange, Alacritech received a sizable upfront fee from each company as well as a cross-license to certain Microsoft and Broadcom patents related to TCP processing. None of the companies would disclose the terms of the licenses; we estimate that, in addition to the patent cross-license, each company paid $10 million to $20 million with no future royalties. These one-time fees represent a small investment for Broadcom and Microsoft but a large windfall for Alacritech, which has been struggling to break even. Alacritech plans to continue to enforce its patents, but it is not clear whether these patents bear on full-offload solutions such as those from Chelsio, Silverback, and Siliquent. Intel's I/OAT, which does not do TCP offload or use TCP Chimney, appears to be unaffected. Rather than rely on licensing income, Alacritech plans to invest its initial fees in improving its line of TCP offload products. The company currently offers 2xGbE NICs and chips with TCP offload capability and is developing 10Gbps technology. Now that Broadcom is a licensed competitor, Alacritech must intensify its efforts to make its hardware business profitable. —Linley Complete
coverage of Alacritech appears in our report A Guide
to Storage Networking Silicon.
On Tuesday, Broadcom announced an agreement to acquire startup Siliquent Technologies for about $76 million in cash. Siliquent had raised more than $31 million, including a $21 million round closed in September 2004. Started as a technology project by Orckit Communications, Siliquent was spun off in October 2001. Although the 59-person company is headquartered in Mountain View, it has a large engineering team in Israel. In July 2004, Siliquent announced sampling of its first product. The SLQ1010 is a 10Gbps protocol processor that uses microcoded engines to handle TCP, iSCSI, and iWARP protocols. Unlike competitors such as Chelsio and NetEffect, Siliquent was selling only chips rather than board-level (NIC/HBA) products and had no disclosed customers. Broadcom has been pushing its so-called converged NIC (CNIC) for servers, which implements TCP offload (TOE), iSCSI, and iWARP. But thus far, Broadcom's CNIC chips have been limited to GbE or proprietary 2.5Gbps speeds. Because Broadcom's CNIC designs rely on embedded MIPS processors, we predicted they would not scale to 10GbE speeds. With its acquisition of Siliquent, Broadcom has addressed this problem and should be able to offer 10GbE CNIC products in the near future. The timing of the acquisition coincides with Broadcom's settlement with Alacritech (see previous item), which removed uncertainty around the future of its TCP offload implementations. —Bob Complete
coverage of Siliquent appears in our report A Guide
to Gigabit and 10G Ethernet Silicon.
This week, Vitesse announced new 16- and 24-port GbE switches intended for smart (web-managed) designs. The SparX-G16 and -G24 support a feature set similar to that of the SparX-G8, which is the industry's only 8xGbE switch with integrated octal PHY. Like the G8, the G16/G24 also integrate eight 10/100/1000 copper PHYs. The remaining GbE ports on the new chips use SGMII to attach one or two external Vitesse octal PHYs (VSC8538/8558). Compared with the G8, the G16/G24 add an MII interface for connecting an external processor. For smart designs, however, the processor is optional as the G16/G24 integrate the same microcontroller found in the G8. The SparX-G16 (VSC7389) and SparXG24 (VSC7390) are currently sampling priced at $48 and $64 in volume, respectively. Despite integrating an octal PHY, the chips come in a cost-effective thermally enhanced PGBA. At first blush, the justification for adding an octal PHY to a 16- or 24-port switch is not obvious. But one look at the Vitesse reference design makes the reason clear. Integrating the equivalent of one PHY chip allows the G16/G24 to be placed directly behind an 8xRJ45 connector. This, in turn, allows the PCB depth to be reduced by the depth of a PHY chip, resulting in a very compact board design. Broadcom's competing smart design requires at least one additional PHY, an external microcontroller/processor, and a larger PCB, which all add cost. With the introduction of these new chips, Vitesse now offers a clear integration advantage for smart GbE switches spanning 5 to 24 ports. —Bob Complete coverage of GbE chips from Vitesse appears in our report A Guide to Gigabit and 10G Ethernet Silicon. This week, EZchip announced sampling of its NP-2 network processor. The NP-2, which actually reached the first customers in June, is the industry's first 10Gbps full-duplex NPU with integrated traffic manager. Although detailed verification continues, initial testing at EZchip and at customers has not revealed any significant problems. This is noteworthy because, in addition to integrating major new functions such as the TM, EZchip built the NP-2 at TSMC rather than previous foundry IBM. —Bob The plethora of new wireless standards emerging for the PAN, LAN, and MAN makes it difficult to keep current on the latest trends and technologies in this market. This all-new report from The Linley Group provides the clear explanations you need to understand the positioning of each of these technologies and where they might compete. In UWB, there are both competing and complementary standards and specifications, including MBOA/WiMedia, Wireless USB, 802.15.3a, and DS-UWB. In Wi-Fi, the focus is on 802.11n and why MIMO is important. WiMAX has emerged as the standard for broadband wireless access (BWA), but what are all the flavors and how do they relate to the 802.16 standards? As these technologies move into mass production, several vendors are vying to deliver chips that embody these wireless technologies. The report provides background on each of these new wireless technologies, with in-depth coverage of the chip vendors in each segment. Our analysis looks beyond the hype to identify what's really available. We provide detailed coverage of more than 20 chip vendors, including product details and roadmap information where available. For each segment, we compare the available solutions and pick our winners. Only The Linley Group's unique technology analysis can provide this forward-looking view. In UWB, we examine WiMedia products from vendors such as Alereon, Staccato, and Wisair. We also cover impulse-UWB chips from Freescale and Artimi. In Wi-Fi, we look at multiple-antenna designs from Airgo Networks, Atheros, and Metalink and discuss how these relate to 802.11n. For WiMAX, we look at both subscriber-station (CPE) and base-station solutions from large vendors and startups including Fujitsu, Intel, picoChip Designs, Sequans Communications, and Wavesat. Order by August 31 to get a special prepublication discount.
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