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| QinetiQ Quixilica Callisto VXS-1 |
Long Beach, CA — May 16, 2005 — TEK Microsystems, Inc. of Chelmsford MA and QinetiQ of Malvern, UK today announced the new Quixilica Callisto VXS-1, the first VXS product to combine a high-density FPGA processing platform with a digital I/O architecture that provides an unprecedented full duplex I/O bandwidth of up to 190 Gbits/s. Designed to be hosted in a fabric switch slot within a VITA 41 (VXS) compliant backplane, Callisto is equipped with up to five Xilinx Virtex-II Pro XC2VP50 FPGAs. This combination of FPGA technology with very high bandwidth I/O links makes Callisto an ideal platform for management, processing, and distribution of the high volumes of data that are typically generated by advanced sensors in applications such as radar, mobile communications and electronic warfare.
“By providing a massive FPGA processing resource at the heart of the VXS communications fabric, Callisto achieves an optimal balance between processing power and IO bandwidth, maximizing the value that can be extracted from the use of FPGAs for signal processing,” said Andrew Reddig, president and CTO of TEK Microsystems, Inc. “Systems using Callisto along with front end cards such as Tekmicro’s JazzStream or QinetiQ’s Venus and Neptune A/D interfaces now provide FPGA processing options at all stages in the signal processing chain, with the bandwidth necessary to fully utilize FPGA processing for core functions such as adaptive beamforming.”
Dr. Bill Smith of QinetiQ also comments, “Callisto provides an important link in a typical VXS processing chain. There is a rapidly growing ecosystem developing around the VITA 41 open standard and the TekMicro / QinetiQ partnership has emerged as a leading light in this community, offering a wide range of VXS payload cards to provide analogue and digital I/O processing solutions. Callisto provides the functionality needed to efficiently interconnect such products to create scalable, flexible system solutions that provide a platform for solving the most challenging real time problems.”
In a VXS backplane Callisto concentrates data streams at rates of 12.5 Gbits/s each from up to 16 VXS payload cards such as QinetiQ’s Venus or Neptune A/D interfaces or Tekmicro’s JazzStream I/O carriers. Callisto can also operate to fan data out to multiple processing resources on VXS payload cards in applications where a work farm of processing resources is required. The use of FPGAs to implement the high bandwidth backplane links allows a high degree of flexibility for users to choose and modify the data communication protocol employed across the VXS backplane network fabric.
Callisto supports connections, of up to 12 links of 2.5 Gbits on the front panel, to other system components (e.g. sensor front ends) which may be located remotely, or to provide a bridge to separate chassis (e.g. legacy processing racks). The front panel links are implemented using Small Form Pluggable (SFP) modules which can be populated with fiber optic or copper transceivers to support a wide range of protocols such as Gigabit Ethernet, Fibre Channel, Infiniband or Serial FPDP. Using the front panels connection for I/O, Callisto can also act as a standalone FPGA sensor processing resource or co-processing resource if other VXS cards are not required.
Callisto utilizes Xilinx Virtex-II Pro FPGAs to interface to the high bandwidth VXS backplane links. Each FPGA has a large logic resource and is also equipped with 128 Mbytes of memory therefore providing a highly flexible platform to implement processing functions. Together TEK Microsystems and QinetiQ provide a range of development kits, FPGA cores and software allowing customers to maximize development efficiency.
Callisto VXS-1 is part of the QinetiQ Quixilica VXS family of FPGA based processing hardware which provides a complete range of flexible analog and digital I/O products in the VXS form factor. VXS adds a high-speed connector to VME boards to support switched fabric interconnects such as Infiniband, Serial RapidIO and PCI Express with data rates up to 25 GBits/s for each 6U payload slot. Callisto is compatible with the switch fabric slot in a VXS backplane, which is designed to provide routing of the 25 GBit/s data streams between the VXS payload slots.
TEK Microsystems will offer Callisto as part of the Jazz family of VXS based I/O, processing and data recording products and will market Callisto directly through its distribution channels in the USA and Canada. The Quixilica Callisto VXS-1 is available from TEK Microsystems www.tekmicro.com 60 days ARO. Pricing starts at $21,000 for single unit quantities.
About TEK Microsystems, Inc.
Founded in 1981 and headquartered in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, TEK Microsystems, Inc., designs, manufactures and markets a wide range of advanced high-performance boards and systems for embedded real-time computing systems. Tekmicro’s comprehensive product line includes advanced carrier boards based on widely adopted industry standards and more than 30 PMC/XMC cards. These products are used in real-time systems designed for data acquisition, instrumentation, control systems and signal processing in customer applications such as reconnaissance, signals intelligence, satellite telemetry, mine detection, medical imaging, radar, sonar, semiconductor inspection and seismic research. Under a commercial alliance TEK Microsystems and QinetiQ jointly develop, market and sell high performance PMC and XMC I/O modules, I/O carriers, A/D and D/A interfaces, FPGA processors and complete signal processing and data acquisition systems solutions in the United States and Canada.
About QinetiQ
QinetiQ (pronounced ki’ ne tik) is Europe’s largest science and technology solutions company with unrivalled expertise in the defense and security sectors. Founded In July 2001 from the majority of DERA (Defense Evaluation and Research Agency) the laboratories of the United Kingdom Ministry of Defense, QinetiQ employs nearly 10,000 people, including many of the UK’s leading scientists and internationally acclaimed experts. QinetiQ operates in markets as diverse as defense, security, automotive, information technology, health, aerospace, rail, telecommunications, electronics, space, marine, energy and oil & gas.