Aries PCIe®/CXL® Smart Cable Modules™

Multi-rack GPU clustering for AI
over copper cables

Download Portfolio Brief

Unleash GPU-to-GPU Clustering Across Racks

  • Extends PCIe® 6.0, 5.0, PCIe 4.0, and CXL® signal reach across dense AI racks using Active Electrical Cables
  • Built on the proven track record of our widely deployed and field-tested Aries PCIe/CXL Smart DSP Retimers
  • Supports multiple form factors and configurations to accommodate diverse AI system topologies
  • COSMOS suite for performance optimization and seamless fleet management across dense AI platforms

Aries SCM Highlights

Enabling reliable PCIe/CXL for rack-to-rack connectivity

Robust Signal
Integrity

Over copper cables with flexible link bifurcation

Extended Cable
Reach By

Compared to passive DAC solutions

Enhanced Diagnostics
& Telemetry

Advanced capabilities through in-band and out-of-band management

Why Use Aries Smart Cable Modules?

Aries SCMs enable robust, easy-to-design PCIe and CXL cabling while also offering COSMOS suite of built-in advanced fleet management, security, and deep diagnostic capabilities critical to ensuring high reliability and up-time.

Robustness

  • Supported Data Rates

    64 GT/s, 32 GT/s, 16 GT/s, 8 GT/s, 5 GT/s, and 2.5 GT/s Data Rates with Automatic Link Equalization

  • Power Efficient

    Low power CMOS process and L1.0 Low-Power Mode minimizes rack power/thermal density

  • Low Latency

    Less than 10ns

  • Security

    Advanced security features help prevent malicious attacks of unauthorized firmware loading, module diagnostics access, and configurations

Ease-of-use

  • Thin Cable Gauge

    Offering thin cables in various lengths for flexible bend radius

  • Extended Reach

    Up to 7m for long reach inter-rack PCIe 5.0 connectivity and up to 6m for PCIe 6.x connectivity

  • Flexible Supply Chain

    Aries SCMs are compatible with multiple cable vendors for ease of second sourcing of active cable assemblies and accelerated time to market

  • Interop Testing

    Rigorous system testing with 50+ Endpoints and all major Root Complex

Fleet Management

  • Quick Debug

    Built-in protocol analyzer with Link state history and timestamps, full non-destructive eye scan for RX Lane margining, self-test features to minimize link downtime and accelerate fault isolation

  • Deep Diagnostics

    Firmware-driven link health monitoring to alert BMC of any possible link performance issues

Use Cases

Memory Disaggregation

Expand, pool and share memory between multiple servers to increase memory bandwidth and capacity while providing the option to reclaim stranded or under-utilized…

Resources

Ordering Information

Part NumberDocumentsPCIe Gen PCIe LanesOrderingProduction Status
PM30-6XXPortfolio BriefPCIe 6.xVariousContact Us Pre-Production
PM20-5XXPortfolio BriefPCIe 5.0VariousContact UsProduction

AI Just Outgrew The Server. The Rack-Scale Era Is Here.

The fastest path to AI Infrastructure 2.0 is through purpose-built solutions developed within open ecosystemsWe’ve crossed the Rubicon into AI Infrastructure 2.0. There’s no going back.The evidence is everywhere. The latest reasoning models demonstrate breakthrough capabilities through multi-step processing that demands an order of magnitude more compute than traditional inference….

Read more

Astera Labs Celebrated as a Top Workplace in the Bay Area – Again!

We are thrilled to share that Astera Labs has been recognized for the third consecutive year as one of the Best Places to Work in the Bay Area by the Silicon Valley Business Journal and the San Francisco Business Times. This year, we ranked 11th on the Large Company list (200-499 employees) – a strong testament to our people, culture, and purpose-driven missionWhat makes Astera Labs…

Read more

Advancing AI with AMD: Delivering Purpose-built Connectivity for Scale-up Architecture with UALink

Back in 2017, the founders of Astera Labs identified a looming bottleneck in data center infrastructure. While AI models were evolving at an unprecedented pace, traditional connectivity infrastructure wouldn’t keep up. From the beginning, Astera Labs set out with a clear mission: to deliver purpose-built connectivity solutions for the entire AI rack.Yesterday, we were honored to join…

Read more

Astera Labs and Alchip Announce Strategic Partnership to Advance Silicon Ecosystem for AI Rack-Scale Connectivity

Hyperscalers benefit from seamless integration of purpose-built compute and connectivity solutions to rapidly deploy AI infrastructure at scale– SANTA CLARA, Calif. and TAIPEI, Taiwan – June 16, 2025 – Astera Labs, a leading provider of purpose-built connectivity solutions for AI and cloud infrastructure, and Alchip Technologies, the high-performance ASIC leader, today announced a…

Read more

Astera Labs Expands Collaboration with NVIDIA to Advance NVLink Fusion Ecosystem

NVLink connectivity solutions will further bolster Astera Labs’ Intelligent Connectivity Platform, expanding options for hyperscalers to deploy high-performance, scale-up networks – SANTA CLARA, CA, U.S. – May 19, 2025 – Astera Labs, Inc. (Nasdaq: ALAB), a global leader in semiconductor-based connectivity solutions for AI and cloud infrastructure, today announced it is collaborating…

Read more

Astera Labs Announces Financial Results for the First Quarter of Fiscal Year 2025

Record quarterly revenue of $159.4 million, up 13% QoQ and 144% YoYStrong demand for PCIe scale-up and Ethernet scale-out in custom ASIC platformsPCIe 6 connectivity portfolio poised to ramp in leading GPU-based rack-scale systems starting in Q2 – SANTA CLARA, CA, U.S. – May 6, 2025 – Astera Labs, Inc. (Nasdaq: ALAB), a global leader in semiconductor-based connectivity…

Read more

Astera Labs to Share Vision for Expanding Opportunities in AI Infrastructure with UALink

With broad industry support from 100+ companies in the UALink Consortium and the ratification of the UALink 200G 1.0 specification, UALink is emerging as the essential open standard for scale-up AI infrastructure – SANTA CLARA, CA, U.S. – May 5, 2025 – Astera Labs, Inc. (Nasdaq: ALAB), a global leader in semiconductor-based connectivity solutions for AI and cloud infrastructure,…

Read more

First Look Demo: Scorpio X-Series Fabric Switch

Scorpio X-Series Fabric Switches are architected to deliver the highest back-end bandwidth for AI scale-up (GPU-to-GPU communications.) Learn how Scorpio X-Series enables direct memory access across the fabric, allowing accelerators to read and write data to each other without PU intervention. This design significantly enhances data parallelism, reduces latency, and improves scalability for…

Read more

First Look Demo: Aries 6 Smart Gearbox

See the industry’s first purpose-built PCIe gearbox solution that intelligently bridges the performance gap between the latest PCIe 6 devices and existing PCIe 5 ecosystem.Learn how Aries 6 Gearbox solves the challenge of degraded-performance in mixed-generation systems, ensuring full utilization of high-speed lanes and accelerating the deployment of next-generation AI platforms while…

Read more

NVIDIA GTC 2025: End-to-End PCIe 6 Interop

At NVIDIA GTC 2025, Astera Labs showcased PCIe 6 end-to-end connectivity with our Scorpio P-Series Fabric Switch interconnected to Micron’s PCIe 6 SSD, an NVIDIA Blackwell GPU through our Aries 6 Smart Retimer, and an NVIDIA CX7 NIC card, with an Intel CPU connected on the upstream side. The demonstration shows how our Scorpio P-Series Fabric Switch can support mixed mode traffic, while…

Read more