About us

The Consortium for On-Board Optics (COBO) is working to develop specifications to permit the use of board-mounted optical modules in the manufacturing of networking equipment (i.e., switches, servers). The organization plans to reference industry specifications where possible and develop specifications where required with attention to electrical interfaces, pin-outs, connectors, thermals, etc. for the development of interchangeable and interoperable optical modules that can be mounted onto motherboards and daughtercards. COBO has two working groups: Data Center Networking (DCN) and Coherent.

The DCN working group has three sub-groups:

• Electrical: Host-to-module electrical interface

• Mechanical: Host-board connector, thermal, mechanical, and optical connectivity

• Use Cases and Reliability