Throughout history, there are countless tales of innovation and collaboration that have propelled humanity forward. One such story is the legendary collaboration between the Wright brothers and their mechanic, Charlie Taylor. It took both focusing on different aspects of the airplane’s system to build a functional design. Just as their combined efforts led to the first powered flight, our collaboration with Astera Labs has soared to new heights, culminating in a groundbreaking PCIe Gen6 interoperability demonstration.
Micron PCIe Gen6 SSD
First, let me share a little history. Astera Labs announced their PCIe Gen6 retimer product line (Aries 6 retimers) in March 2024, followed by their entry into the PCIe switch market with the industry’s first PCIe Gen6 switch in October 2024. Micron made news in August 2024 by announcing the first PCIe Gen6 SSD for ecosystem enabling at the FMS conference. Our journey with Astera Labs began when they were a relatively small start-up back in 2019. Over the years, we have worked closely on interoperability testing and co-validation, ensuring that our SSDs deliver optimal performance in diverse environments, including joint work in Astera Labs’ Cloud-Scale Interop Lab. Here, Astera Labs conducts validation testing with our production SSDs, helping ensure that our products work well together at optimal performance.
At DesignCon 2025, Astera Labs demonstrated the industry’s first PCIe Gen6 interoperability between a PCIe Gen6 switch and a PCIe Gen6 SSD endpoint, showcasing the capabilities of their PCIe switches in conjunction with Micron’s SSDs. This public demo marks the culmination of a deep technical collaboration between our respective engineering teams centered on PCIe Gen6 interop testing, including several joint workshops over the past months in Astera Labs and Micron’s validation engineering labs.
One of the most remarkable aspects of this industry-first PCIe Gen6 interoperability demo is that the Micron PCIe Gen6 data center SSD used in the demo achieved 27 GB/s, likely making this a demonstration of the fastest PCIe Gen6 storage drive to date! This achievement is akin to the Wright brothers' first flight, setting a new standard for what is possible and inspiring future innovations.
As we continue to innovate and push the boundaries of technology, our collaboration with Astera Labs remains a cornerstone of our strategy. Together, we are committed to delivering cutting-edge solutions that drive the future of data storage and connectivity, much like the Wright brothers and Charlie Taylor propelled humanity into the age of aviation.
