specifications for 128 GFC serial lanes. Newly developed
Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) allows FC protocols
to run over Ethernet networks. Fibre Channel is completing
development of a standard that maps FC
to Non-Volatile Memory Express over Fabrics (NVMe-oF),
allowing increased network performance and lower
latency. Figure 3 shows the Fibre Channel Industry
Association’s (FCIA) Roadmap for Fibre Channel, which
will continue to remain a major application area for
MMF and VCSELs.
1TFC
512GFC
256GFC
128GFC
64GFC
32GFC
16GFC
200GFCoE
Serial Lane
in SFP
Quad Lane
in QSFP
100GFCoE
2005 2010 2015 2020 2025
50 I ICT TODAY
400GFCoE
19% CGAR 2016-2021
100GFCoE
25GFCoE
50GFCoE
2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021
600
500
400
300
200
100
0
Installed Workloads in Millions
Traditional Data Center (-5% CGAR)
Cloud Data Center (22% CGAR)
17%
83%
6%
94%
FIGURE 4: Workloads/compute instance: traditional data center
versus cloud data center. Source: Cisco Global Cloud Index, 2016-2021.
8GFC
40GFCoE
10GFCoE
Fibre Channel Speed Speed in Development Speed in Development FCoE Speed Speed in Development Possible Future Speed
FIGURE 3: Information from FCIA’s Fibre Channel Roadmap.
Data Center Trends
The single biggest trend for data centers in the last
few years has been the accelerated migration to public
and private cloud data centers. Traditional non-cloud
enterprise data centers are becoming a much smaller
segment of the data center market; large enterprises
are building their own cloud data centers, and smaller
enterprises are using cloud services. The widely cited
and well-regarded Cisco Global Cloud Index (GCI)
2016-20216 predicts that by 2021:
• 94 percent of workloads and compute instances
will be processed by cloud data centers, while
six percent will be processed by traditional
enterprise data centers (Figure 4).
For distances less than 100 to 150 m,
MMF is the solution of choice,
while SMF is typically used for longer
links. Direct-attach copper (DAC)
cables are often used for reaches
less than 5 m.