Point2 Technology Announces Industry-Leading Smart Retimer Mixed-Signal SoC for 800G/1.6T Active Electrical Cable Applications in Hyperscale AI/ML Datacenters

SAN JOSE, Calif., Nov. 18, 2024 – Point2 Technology, a leading provider of ultra-low-power, low-latency mixed-signal SoC solutions for multi-terabit interconnect, today announced its next generation Smart Retimer system-on-chip (SoC) for AEC applications in hyperscale AI/ML datacenters. The Point2 P1B121 integrates eight-unidirectional SerDes channels with smart Clock Data Recovery (CDR)/Retimer functions that support 112G PAM4 and 56G NRZ data rates. This new SoC reinforces Point2’s industry-leading position in delivering low power, ultra-low-latency cable interconnect solutions for tomorrow’s datacenter requirements.

According to a recent Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) report, AI applications and ML workloads account for nearly 20% of datacenter electricity today. With this dramatic surge, datacenters in the U.S. are expected to represent up to 9.1% of total U.S. electricity generation annually by 2030. To tackle this rapid growth, Point2’s pioneering Smart Retimer solutions are designed to alleviate datacenter operations, boosting both energy-efficiency and long-term sustainability for future interconnect infrastructure.

Delivering the lowest power consumption for 112G PAM4 Smart Retimer at 3.0W, the Point2 P1B121 is purpose-built for ultra-low power and low-latency operations in 800 gigabit (800G) and 1.6 Terabit (1.6T) Active Electrical Cables (AECs) helping to reduce cable power and cooling energy demands. The Point2 P1B121 UltraWire Smart Retimer is ideal for a wide range of in-rack and adjacent rack data center configurations including top-of-rack switch to GPU/TPU/CPU server connectivity, rack-to-rack connectivity, and accelerator-to-accelerator compute fabric connectivity. At 3 nanoseconds (3ns), the P1B121 chip latency is an impressive 20X lower than available DSP-based PAM4 Retimers in the market.

“At Point2, we continue to push the limits on power efficiency and sustainability inside the datacenter. We recognize the challenges datacenters face in balancing high-performance and low-latency operations with the need for energy efficiency,” said Sean Park, founder, and CEO of Point2 Technology. “The Point2 P1B121 Smart Retimer SoC is a key solution in addressing those challenges directly and giving datacenters the ability to not only address current 800G data interconnect speeds but prepare for future 1.6T workloads as well.”

Point2’s SoC includes a Bit Error Rate (BER)-aware architecture featuring a series of signal processing building blocks that correlate the total chip BER to the power consumption of each circuit block. The result is the industry’s most energy-efficient interconnect SoC that delivers AECs with 2X lower power consumption than other solutions on the market. The BER performance allows AECs to be manufactured with smaller copper wire gauges, therefore reducing the cable volume and thickness, and extending cable length compared to traditional copper cabling.

“The Point2 P1B121 continues the incredible energy-efficiency and ultra-low latency performance that we’ve come to expect from the company’s interconnect solutions,” said Jairo Guerrero, VP & GM Copper Solution Business Unit at Molex, LLC. “With this new Smart Retimer, we can deliver the AEC performance our hyperscale datacenter customers require while providing a greater power savings and thermal management relief they could not achieve with other DSP-based Retimers in the market today.”

“As cloud datacenters continue to require more data-intensive compute, new short-reach energy-efficient interconnect solutions are necessary. While current direct-attach copper (DAC) and active optical cable (AOC) products each offer unique advantages, they can fall short in meeting the latency, bandwidth and power efficiency required to scale and manage the increased compute requirements of AI applications,” said Lisa Huff, Senior Principal Analyst, Optical Components at Omdia.

Key Features of the Point2 P1B121 UltraWire™ Smart Retimer Include:

Designed for 800G/1600G AECs
Adaptable line equalization to optimize for power, performance, and cable length
Bounded Gearbox transposes 2x56G between 1x112G. Reduces copper twin-ax count by 50% for 400G AECs
Industry’s lowest power consumption at 3.0W per chip, or 6.5W in an 800G paddle card
Industry’s lowest latency at 3ns
Intelligent Diagnostics to ensure reliability, availability, and serviceability of the network
Serializer (TX) with programmable FIR filter and pre-emphasis
De-serializer (RX) with programmable continuous time linear equalizer (CTLE) and decision-feedback equalizer (DFE) to mitigate Rx channel loss
Low sensitivity and adjustable data sampler threshold levels
Programmable TX output swing

Learn more about the Point2 P1B121 UltraWire™ Smart Retimer mixed-single SoC here.

About Point2 Technology

Point2 Technology, headquartered in San Jose, Calif., designs and manufactures ultra-low power, low-latency, point-to-point interconnect and range enhancement SoC solutions purpose-built to meet the bandwidth requirements of hyperscale AI/ML datacenters and 5G infrastructure. Founded by an accomplished team from Marvell, Finisar, and Samsung, Point2 is a leading innovator that is reimagining data center and 5G cloud infrastructure interconnect in the multi-terabit era. www.point2tech.com.