VMETRO goes for Xilinx

VMETRO announced that it will augment its VXS, XMC and PMC based board level product lines to include platforms based on the new Xilinx Virtex™-5 LXT FPGA Platform. As a member of the Xilinx early access program, VMETRO is developing a broad range of board level products that leverage the high-speed serial capabilities of the Virtex-5 LXT FPGAs to support applications such as Electro-Optics (EO), Electronics Warfare (EW), Signal Intelligence (SigInt) and telecommunications for high performance embedded computing and aerospace/defense markets. The second of four domain-optimized platforms in the new Virtex-5 family, the 65nm Virtex-5 LXT platform is the first FPGA to deliver a hard-coded PCI Express® Endpoint and Tri-mode Ethernet Media Access Controller (MAC) blocks. The Virtex-5 LXT platform offers multi-channel multi-Gbps serial communications (up to 3.2 Gbps per channel) which allows for increased system flexibility, bandwidth and scalability – critical benefits to VMETRO customers building next-generation FPGA-based solutions. “VMETRO's proven track record of developing effective Xilinx based FPGA solutions has allowed us early access to the low power serial I/O and built-in PCI Express advantages of Virtex-5 LXT FPGAs that will help deliver the next generation of our PMC, VXS and XMC product lines," said Dave Barker, Vice President of Business Development at VMETRO, Inc. “The addition of low power, built-in serial communications makes the development of sophisticated solutions easier and more powerful. Xilinx being first to market with these capabilities helps us deliver our next generation products to meet our customer expectations. We are excited by these developments and believe our customers will be too."