Since the emergence of orthogonal midplane system architecture, more communications equipment designers are adopting this packaging scheme to accomplish direct, efficient connections between multiple line cards and a common switch or communications card. Vertical daughter cards on one side of a midplane have a direct connection to horizontal add-in cards on the opposite side of the midplane. The orthogonal solution eliminates long, complex traces, via stub effects, simplifies signal links and reduces backplane layer count.

FCI has developed high density and performance connectors that meet designer’s requirements for up to 20 Gb/s using 72 crossover pairs in a 25 mm card slot configuration.

Flexible connector design also enables designers to allocate connector columns to backplane or power wafers for product customization.

Tools have also been included to assist the designer.