Broadcom Inc. today debuted two chips for powering so-called PON infrastructure, which is used by internet providers to deliver connectivity to their subscribers.

Both processors include artificial intelligence features that promise to ease maintenance tasks.

A PON, or passive optical network, is a type of optical network that incorporates so-called passive beam splitters. Those are optical components that can catch a piece of data while it’s zipping across the network, create multiple copies and route each copy to a different destination. Passive beam splitters don’t consume any electricity, which makes them more cost-efficient than certain competing products. 

An internet provider’s PON distributes data traffic to consumers’ homes in multiple steps. The first stop is a device known as an OLT that turns the electric signals in which the data traffic is carried into light. From there, the light travels across a fiber-optic cable until it reaches a so-called ONU. This is a networking device that is located near consumers’ homes and turns the data back into electric signals before forwarding it to user devices. 

Broadcom’s two new chips are known as the BCM68660 and BCM55050. They’re designed to power OLT and ONU devices, respectively.

Many current PONs are based on a standard called GPON that supports download speeds of up to 2.5 gigabits per second. Some carriers also use XGS-PON, a newer technology that is four times faster. Broadcom’s two chips support both standards as well as 50G PON, an even faster technology that is 40 times faster than GPON. 

The BCM68660 and BCM55050 also share several other features. Both chips are based on a seven-nanometer manufacturing process and include a neural processing unit optimized to run AI models. According to Broadcom, internet providers can use the latter module to run algorithms that automate tasks such as fixing network issues. 

The BCM68660, the first new chip that the company debuted today, includes five quad-core central processing units. All five chips are based on Arm Holdings plc’s ubiquitous instruction set architecture. The CPUs power 56 network interfaces for processing data traffic, eight of which support the high-speed 50G PON standard.

The BCM55050, Broadcom’s other new chip, features a simple design. It combines a dual-core CPU with a number of specialized compute modules, most notably a 50G network processor optimized to manage data traffic. Internet providers can deploy it together with the BCM68660 in their networks. 

“Delivering dramatic cost and power savings, Broadcom’s 50G PON solution enables telcos worldwide to future-proof their networks and cost-effectively deploy 50G fiber broadband to drive the next generation of applications,” said Rich Nelson, senior vice president and general manager of Broadcom’s broadband video group.

The company is currently sampling the new chips to early customers.

Photo: Broadcom