Broadcom Announces Industry's First Quad 10GbE SFP+ PHY with MACsec

The new Broadcom BCM84756 40nm CMOS Quad SFI-XFI10GbE transceiver sets a new threshold for performance and is the industry's first SFP+PHY supporting short reach (SR), long reach (LR), long reach over multi-mode fiber (LRM), and copper with full 802.1AE MACsec functionality. The addition of the BCM84756 also extends Broadcom's leadership portfolio of single, dual and quad channel SFP+ physical layer devices, employing its market proven technology to deliver secure communications over data center and enterprise networks.

Also included with the BCM84756 is a MACsec-enabled software development kit (SDK) that supports easy integration with Broadcom's market-leading portfolio of switch system-on-a-chip (SoC) solutions. Broadcom will demonstrate its latest optical solutions for wired networking at this week's Optical Fiber Communication Conference and Exposition (OFC), March 8-10, 2011 at the Los Angeles Convention Center, Booth #1557.

Highlights/Key Facts:

* Companies, such as large investment firms, and medical and engineering companies, require reassurance that the data they send to their networks, and receive from their networks, is secure and has not been compromised.
* The Broadcom BCM84756 10GbE SFP-XFI transceiver with MACsec support is compliant with the IEEE 801.1AE standard. It is targeted for 10GbE links in data center and enterprise systems that carry high bandwidth traffic (such as financial information, engineering designs and scientific data), and require MACsec data integrity.
* The IEEE 802.1AE MACsec standard helps to safeguard communications at different points in the network. Unlike the Internet Protocol security (IPsec) standard that secures only IP data at the Ethernet level, the MACsec protocol effectively secures any type of data over Ethernet with the objective of authenticating the origin of data while protecting its integrity and confidentiality.
* The MACsec standard helps protect LAN devices from unauthorized communications, which in turn, helps to prevent disruptions to Ethernet networks.
* This device is part of a broad portfolio of 65nm and 40nm MACsec capable devices available from Broadcom, operating between 1 and 10Gbps, over a variety of physical layer interfaces.
* The BCM84756 10GbE transceiver is now sampling to early access customers with production volume expected in calendar Q3 2011.


Supporting Quotes:

Brad Smith, Sr. Vice President and Industry Analyst, LightCounting Optical Market Research

Clearly, MACsec is needed as the next phase in the evolution of 10Gbps in the enterprise — not only for Ethernet but FCoE for storage as well. Anything that can be done to increase the level of security and block unauthorized access will be welcomed by datacenter executives around the world as it is a leading issue of concern — especially given the scale of government sponsored attacks on individual companies. Having consistent MACsec security across both copper and optical interfaces will insure market traction by what ever the physical media used is - 10GBASE-T Ethernet, SFP+ Direct Attach copper as well as SFP+ optical interfaces for servers and switches.