Altera Corporation has announced the world's first demonstration of the company's Optical FPGA technology changing how bandwidth-intensive applications can be designed and built. Developed in conjunction with Avago Technologies, the demonstration shows how Altera's optically interconnected programmable devices can significantly increase interconnect bandwidth while reducing overall system complexity, power, and price. The technology demonstration is one in a series of recent innovations delivered by Altera, including the industry's first OpenCL program for FPGAs and 28-Gbps transceiver technology delivering the industry's highest data rates with superior signal integrity. Altera has been showing select customers the demonstration over the last quarter and will showcase it at the Optical Fibre Communication Conference and Exposition (OFC) being held at the Los Angeles Convention Center.
Bradley Howe, VP, IC Engineering, Altera said, "The Optical FPGA technology demonstration underscores Altera's commitment to develop innovations that address major industry challenges and ultimately, enable new innovations. As data rate demands continue to rapidly increase, engineers need to look beyond copper and traditional optical solutions in order to meet the performance, cost, and power demands of next-generation video, cloud computing, and 3D gaming applications."
The demonstration shows Altera's Optical FPGA technology on a test board derived from the company's Stratix IV FPGA 100G development kit, integrated with Avago Technologies' 12-Channel MicroPOD optical modules.
Philip Gadd, VP & GM, Fiber Optics Product Division, Avago said, "As the world leader in Data Center optics, Avago worked with Altera to combine our proven MicroPOD optical modules with their Stratix FPGAs, taking the concept of embedded parallel optics to the next level of integration. This will allow FPGA users to utilize the high bandwidth and compact size advantages of parallel optical interfaces that are currently used in data centers."
