Spirent and MultiLane Collaborate to Enable 800G Ecosystem

Spirent Communications, the leading provider of test, assurance, and analytics solutions for next-generation devices and networks, today announced that it has partnered with MultiLane, a global leader in data center interconnects, to offer vendor-neutral testing solutions supporting the 800G ecosystem. This milestone is a result of the two companies’ joint mission to enable 800G infrastructure development and adoption, and help the industry resolve testing challenges, no matter the interconnect strategy.

QSFP-DD800 is one of the first port standards that uses individual electrical 100G lanes. The design, optimization, and fabrication of these 100G lanes presents a significant challenge for host and pluggable developers alike. The partnership facilitates the test and verification of QSFP-DD hardware, including transceivers, switches that use these transceivers, and hyperscaler use cases.

“Successful 100G electrical lane design requires novel techniques and robust test procedures,” said Kees Propstra, Vice President of Marketing at MultiLane. “Our joint effort with Spirent to tackle these challenges facilitates the transition to the 800G node, the next frontier in data center interconnects.”

Spirent offers 800G validation solutions for the entire ecosystem, offering interconnect, network equipment manufacturers (NEMs), and hyperscalers multiple options to help implement their 800G solutions, with support for various speed modes including 1x800G, 2x400G, 4x200G and 8x100G. The company helps its customers qualify equipment so they can determine which supplier will best meet their requirements. For partners, Spirent provides a neutral test solution to validate their vendors.

“Spirent has developed a comprehensive, end-to-end 800G testing suite that leverages our decades of experience in Ethernet testing,” said Aniket Khosla, VP of Product Management, Cloud and IP at Spirent Communications. “Our partnership with MultiLane will assure successful deployments of this complex new technology while helping customers improve product quality and ensure reliable, high-quality user experiences.”

With its high-value test solutions like QSFPDD-800 thermal load loopbacks, module/host compliance boards and noise injection Bit Error Rate Testers (BERTs), MultiLane continues to support the rapid development of 800G technologies. In addition, as the pre-eminent Signal Integrity expert, performing extensive research and simulations in the domain of routing and footprint optimization, MultiLane is offering design and consultancy services, of which the partnership with Spirent is a proof point.

While 400G technology is still relatively new, customers are already looking to Spirent and MultiLane for new 800G test solutions to validate high-density, higher-power-consuming applications, as the ecosystem looks to deliver even faster capabilities that can maximize capacity of existing space-limited physical locations.