Eudyna Devices, Mitsubishi Electric, NEC Electronics, Oki Electric Industry, Opnext and Sumitomo Electric Industries have announced common specifications for pigtail-type optical devices based on the 40 Gb/s optical-device multisource agreement (XLMD-MSA) introduced by the companies in March 2007. The MSA specifications are for external-modulation laser transmitter devices with built-in driver ICs and PIN-TIA (PIN photodiode with a transimpedance amplifier) receiver devices that comply with the 40 Gb/s interface standard for SONET (synchronous optical networking) OC-768. 10 Gb/s optical transmission interfaces are widely used in metropolitan area networks, local area networks and storage area networks. The XLMD-MSA aims to establish compatible sources of 40 Gb/s optical transmitter and receiver devices embedded in the 40 Gb/s optical transceiver modules. They include mechanical dimensions and pin assignments of pigtail-type optical devices; high-speed electrical interface using a dual SMPM (simultaneous multiprotocol management) connectors, and optical and electrical characteristics. The XLMD-MSA committee said it will continue to discuss corresponding optical device specifications. The new specifications are available at: www.xlmdmsa.org