LSI Introduces Axxia 5500 Communication Processors with ARM Technology for High-Performance, Power-Efficient Networks

The LSI Axxia 5500 product family is first to combine 16 ARM cores with LSI specialized networking accelerators to optimize performance and power efficiency. The Axxia 5500 product family allows networking service providers enhanced intelligent wireless capabilities through base stations, cell site routers, gateways and mobile backhaul equipment.

The Axxia 5500 product benefits include:

-Reliable, deterministic performance to contend with the massive data deluge driven by smartphones, tablets and cloud-based services
-Increased power efficiency that enables OEMs to widely deploy high-performance macro and small cell base station solutions
-Lower capital expenditure costs and optimized system design due to integration of networking acceleration functions including up to 50Gb/s packet processing, 20Gb/s security processing and 160Gbps of Ethernet switching via 16 10Gb Ethernet interfaces

“Mobile broadband growth is outpacing infrastructure capability, and service providers need solutions that will meet traffic performance needs while also minimizing cost and power consumption,” said Jim Anderson, senior vice president and general manager, Networking Solutions Group, LSI. “The Axxia 5500 product family addresses these needs with an exciting and very flexible architecture that delivers exceptionally high performance without sacrificing power efficiency.”

The Axxia 5500 product family will include a range of communication processors with different core counts and throughput capabilities and are the first in the industry to deliver 16 ARM Cortex-A15 cores using ARM’s CoreLink CCN-504 low-latency interconnect in 28nm process technology. The combination of LSI’s networking expertise, specialized acceleration engines and Virtual Pipeline technology with ARM’s power-efficient processors and interconnect IP delivers communication processors that are uniquely suited for building intelligent, heterogeneous networks.

“The combination of ARM’s leading coherent interconnect, energy-efficient multicore processor technology and advanced physical IP in the LSI Axxia 5500 series delivers significant gains in performance density. This will enable highly efficient systems with new levels of software flexibility and scalability for heterogeneous networks,” said Ian Ferguson, vice president of Segment Marketing, ARM. “LSI and ARM enjoy a strong relationship, and we are working to meet the needs of customers who are focusing on building next-generation network infrastructure.”

LSI provides a comprehensive tool suite and production-quality wireless application enablement software. LSI’s optimized, high-performance layer two through four software packages provide a complete wireless transport solution for networking OEMs, eliminating the need to invest in data plane software development. The LSI Axxia platform is ideal for OEMs to meet accelerated time-to-market goals and efficiently leverage their development resources for emerging heterogeneous network architectures.

Growing users of smartphones, laptops and tablets are driving the need for more capacity and use of advanced mobile networks including 4G/LTE, said Joseph Byrne, senior analyst for The Linley Group. The Axxia 5500 communication processor family, with its scalable architecture that combines LSI’s proven accelerators, high-capacity Ethernet switching, and ARM processor and interconnect technologies, will help enable networking equipment OEMs to design next-generation equipment that can meet the demands of mobile networks.

LSI will showcase its portfolio of networking acceleration solutions at Hall 6 - Stand 6B60 at the GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, February 25-28.