400G to 4×100G Breakout AEC Cable

One switch port. Four server connections. The AEC-400G-QDD-4*QSFP56 breaks a single 400G QSFP56-DD port into four independent 100G QSFP56 links — active copper, up to 8 meters, built for AI inference fabrics and high-density data center breakout.

The Asteraix AEC-400G-QDD-4*QSFP56 is a breakout active electrical cable that splits a single 400G QSFP56-DD switch port into four independent 100G QSFP56 connections. On the switch side, 8 lanes of 56G PAM4 carry the full 400G signal. On the server side, each of the four QSFP56 legs carries 2 lanes of 56G PAM4, delivering exactly 100G per port — at up to 8 meters on 30AWG copper.

Unlike passive breakout DACs limited to ~3m, the active signal conditioning in this AEC extends clean breakout reach to 8 meters — covering full-rack and adjacent-rack deployments. It is QSFP-DD MSA, QSFP56 MSA, and CMIS 5.2 compliant, with a full I²C management interface on the QSFP-DD end. Power consumption is 7.5W at the QSFP-DD head and just 3.5W per QSFP56 tail — the most power-efficient breakout geometry in the AEC product family. The datasheet explicitly lists AI Inference Fabric as a primary application, reflecting its role in connecting 400G-capable spine switches to inference servers running multiple 100G NIC ports.