Ensphere's Shipments of Thunderbolt (Optical) Chips Exceeded 500k in 2011

The First Cost Effective Optical Transport for Laptops, and A Major Milestone for Ensphere

Santa Clara, Calif., October 3, 2011 – Ensphere Solutions, an emerging leader in advanced communications semiconductor ICs, today announced that the shipments of ESI-XVR10100 have exceeded 500k devices in 2011. This product is a dual 10G transceiver device targeting the optical modules intended for the optical version of Thunderbolt (previously codenamed as “Light Peak”).

Thunderbolt is a new high speed I/O technology and is initially able to support two full-duplex 10 Gbps links. Intel Corporation and its PC OEM partners have developed this technology from ground up to be small, low-power, and inexpensive making it an ideal technology for portable devices. Thunderbolt is a flexible technology and can support both optical and copper-based cables. It supports daisy chaining effectively reducing the number of system connectors. Another advantage of Thunderbolt is its ability to transport PCIe traffic outside the host enabling peripheral vendors to offer new and innovative features without burdening the host laptops.

Ensphere Solutions’ ESI-XVR10100 is the only integrated circuit (IC) needed in the optical module and can support up to two independent full-duplex links each running at 10 Gbps. It is a monolithic device with a flexible architecture supporting out-of-band signaling, and various power management modes.

“One of our challenges has been to integrate two sets of 10G transmit and receive stages on a single CMOS die, and still meet stringent performance metrics” said Hessam Mohajeri, Ensphere’s Chief Executive Officer. “A bigger challenge has been to meet extremely demanding price and power dissipation targets mandated by our customers”.

“Our product offering is far more than just a functional and cost effective chip. Ensphere’s true value add is its wealth of experience accumulated while working with our customers, partners, and PC OEMs.” said Al Gharakhanian, Ensphere’s Vice President of Marketing.

ESI-XVR10100 can also be utilized in Thunderbolt active optical cables (AOCs). Active optical cables are fiber-based cables but have electrical terminations at both ends. They are an alternative to copper Thunderbolt cables and are able to support far longer lengths compared to their copper counterparts.

Availability

ESI-XVR10100 is now available in die form in production quantities.

About Ensphere Solutions Inc.

Ensphere Solutions Inc., a privately held company based on Silicon Valley, CA., offers advanced communications semiconductor standard products. The initial focus of the company is to develop and market physical layer chips for optical and copper interconnect technologies intended for consumer electronic and portable platforms. For more information visit www.enspheresolutions.com