IP Cores Serve Broadband Applications

A host of intellectual property (IP) cores is available for use in broadband communication applications such as SONET, PDH, ATM and Fast Ethernet. The cores, created both by Lucent and independent IP vendors under the firm’s ORCA Core Alliance program, are targeted to Lucent’s ORCA line of FPGAs and field-programmable system chips as well as standard-cell ASICs.One independent IP vendor, Modelware, has expanded its ATM core offerings to include four new cores. The multichannel transmission convergence core provides a UTOPIA interface for up to 31 DS1/E1 lines to an ATM layer and implements the broadband ISDN functions of the transmission convergence sublayer. That core is available now. Another offering, Modelware’s inverse multiplexing for ATM (IMA) core, groups a number of physical links such as DS1/E1 or DS3/E3 to form a logical link whose bandwidth approximates that of the individual links (see diagram). This allows for modular bandwidth using existing physical links to access ATM networks.