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  "path": "/article/4141412/cisco-lpo-not-a-panacea-but-plays-strategic-role-in-ai-networks.html",
  "publishedAt": "2026-03-06T17:53:42.000Z",
  "site": "https://www.networkworld.com",
  "tags": [
    "Artificial Intelligence, Enterprise Routers, Network Switches, Networking, Networking Devices",
    "networking for AI",
    "ratcheted up the speed of its Silicon One portfolio",
    "Bill Gartner",
    "recent Network World",
    "co-packaged optics (CPO) will also play a big role"
  ],
  "textContent": "Cisco has committed to developing Linear Pluggable Optics (LPO) options for its Silicon One family to address the growing need for lower power, high-throughput networking for AI.\n\nCisco recently ratcheted up the speed of its Silicon One portfolio with the introduction of a 102.4 Terabit/sec G300 chip and switch family. As part of that launch, Cisco rolled out its first commercially available 800G LPO modules for its Nexus 9000 series switches and 8000 series routers. Outfitted with the LPO module, these networking boxes are aimed at AI leaf-spine fabrics, data center interconnects, and other high density 800G deployments, according to Cisco.\n\nSupporting 800G LPO on Nexus 9000 and 8000 series platforms takes advantage of the power of the Silicon One architecture while addressing the energy savings and network performance needs that hyperscalers or other high-end users need now, experts say.\n\n“For us, there are going to be niche, targeted applications for 800G LPO, in my view, and customers seeking to reduce power will take advantage of it, but it’s not a panacea,” Bill Gartner, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco’s optical systems and optics business, told _Network World_.\n\nIn other words, it’s not fully plug-and-play like some non-LPO optics, Gartner said. “We can’t make a claim that you can take our 800G LPO, or anybody else’s, and just plug it into anybody’s host, and it’s going to work. It’s going to require some pairwise testing, and it has to be paired with an LPO optic on the other end of the link as well,” Gartner said. Not all silicon is capable of doing this reliably, and that’s why LPO deployments need thorough validation between the optic and the host platform.\n\nIn all LPO implementations, the technology shifts where signal processing occurs. In LPO, the digital signal processor (DSP) function is handled by the host switch or router rather than in the optical module.\n\n“What our LPO is doing is benefitting greatly from what’s going on in Silicon One and the software there,” Gartner said. “For customers that especially are deploying Silicon One on both ends of the link, there’s a 30% or 50% power reduction.”\n\nThe key technology in Silicon One is its strong support for serializer/deserializer (SerDes) capabilities on its switching ASIC. The new G300 chip found in the 9000 and 8000 boxes features 512 lanes of 200 Gbps SerDes for a total switching capacity of 102.4 Tbps, supporting low-power interconnects with extended reach—500 meters or even 2 kilometers —is important for large-scale AI and GPU clusters, according to Gartner.\n\nAnother issue with utilizing LPO technology is the reliability of the optics involved– a topic Cisco has been pushing hard on. In a recent Network World article, Gartner said that Cisco conducted a reliability test for which it acquired 20 different optics from different suppliers. “These were 100G and 400G optics at the time,” and all were compliant with industry standards, and yet “none of those optics passed our stress test,” he said.\n\nCisco’s testing environments make changes to different conditions, such as the temperature or humidity level, or the voltage level that the optic is seeing on the host, or the skew between the signals coming from the host. “We do all of those things in various combinations,” Gartner said.\n\nWhile optics might technically comply with industry standards, “what we know is that if they were put into a stressful environment … they wouldn’t perform,” he said, “and so that’s the thing that we’re trying to raise awareness of for our customers.”\n\nMoving forward, other Silicon One-based systems are likely to support LPO modules, Gartner said. And ultimately co-packaged optics (CPO) will also play a big role.\n\n“I think CPO will basically find its home and scale up AI primarily. Others will say it’s going to have more widespread use. But I think scale up is really the sweet spot for CPO,” Gartner said.\n\n“Longer term, CPO has the potential of delivering higher reliability. But in the short run, I think we must be very cautious as an industry to make sure that we haven’t introduced issues in the field because of challenges in manufacturing, and especially in the fiber attach,” Gartner said.\n\nIt’s different with LPOs, he said. “You’ve got one pluggable that might have to be replaced. So, you’ve certainly got less of a blast radius with LPO.”",
  "title": "Cisco: LPO not a panacea but plays strategic role in AI networks"
}