NEC Debuts ExpEther 40G, Connecting PCIe Devices over Ethernet

NEC announced the general availability in North America of its ExpEther 40G technology as an advanced version of ExpEther 1G/10G.

The ExpEther technology enables system expansion by connecting PCI Express devices directly, using an Ethernet infrastructure. As the ExpEther keeps the native PCI Express connectivity, the PCI Express devices can also be operated as a single system, despite being distributed in different locations connected by Ethernet. This process enables standard PCI Express configurations, interruptions, and hot plugging to be remotely performed with an Ethernet LAN, as if they were connected to a virtual single-hop PCI Express switch.

NEC said its ExpEther 40G technology delivers a compelling solution for real-time Big Data processing and other data center workload acceleration. It does so by enabling the connection of GPGPU, NVMe SSD, or FPGA-based accelerators via an Ethernet connection. NEC has closely collaborated with Xilinx, a fellow ExpEther Consortium member, to validate and enable the ExpEther 40G technology as either an IP core or an ExpEther platform leveraging Xilinx UltraScale FPGAs. NEC launched the IP core business in January 2016.

NEC hopes to develop additional business opportunities by collaborating with OpenPOWER foundation members IBM and Xilinx to increase the scalability of ExpEther technology and the Power8 Processor.

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