VITA Hall of Fame

While a young engineer at Bell Labs, in the early 1980s, Banton cut his teeth on VMEbus where he took part in an effort that mapped the VMEbus specification to an AT&T proprietary line-card format for a switching system they were developing in research. He later landed at Mercury Systems for a decade, starting there in 1996.

At Mercury Systems, he took part in many of the standards activities that were key to the future generations of Mercury System products. Some of the concepts, which set the foundation for VITA-48 VPX REDI, were innovations borne out of the Mercury Systems PowerStream 7000 development. Seven patents were issued to Banton, and members of the development team, for those innovations.

He vividly recalls making the proposal for what became VITA-48 VPX REDI. It was in the upper-room of a Scottsdale meeting location; he had mostly lost his voice overnight and struggled to do the presentation. He felt like he had done a lousy job, and wow! – He closed to a robust round of applause from the excited attendees.

The VITA 48 working group was formed at the January 2004 VSO meeting. The purpose of the group was to develop an enhanced thermal management standard suitable for the new ruggedized VPX initiative. A standard, which would harmonize the various cooling methods: Air, conduction, spray, and liquid flow-through. The title of the original draft was “Mechanical Specifications for Microcomputers Using Enhanced Ruggedized Design Implementation (ERDI).” With the magic of marketing insight from Rich Jaenicke, “ERDI” was rearranged to the market-friendly “REDI” (Rugged Enhanced Design Implementation)!

Banton took part in the development of many VITA standards (VITA 5.1, VITA 17, VITA 41, VITA 46, VITA 47, and VITA 50, to name a few) as a key contributor by supporting, chairing, and working the details directly or feeding back into others at Mercury Systems.

Key contributions:

• VITA 48 VPX REDI – working group chair for more than two years
• VITA 42, Rapid IO mapping – working group chair until publication
• 26 patents spanning his career – the first was one from Bell Labs, the research switching system which used VMEbus
• A motivating force behind the Mercury Systems and VITA patent license agreement for U.S. Patent No. 6,759,588

John Wemekamp spent over thirty-two years in the embedded computing industry. He was a leader in influencing and advocating key VITA standards.

After graduating with an Electrical Engineering degree from Queens University in Kingston, Ontario, Wemekamp started his engineering career with Bell-Northern Research, leading a development team in telecommunication products.

Wemekamp spearheaded the VMEbus board level product hardware design effort at Dy 4 Systems in Ottawa, during the early 1980s where he led the design and development of their first generation of VMEbus products. During this time, he played an influential role at VITA standards meetings and during the IEEE 1014, and later ANSI, standardization process that followed the enthusiastic market adoption of VMEbus.

Wemekamp’s career spanned from hardware engineering and management to marketing, business development, and strategic planning. He retired in 2015 from Curtiss-Wright as their Business Development & Chief Technology Officer for Defense Solutions (DS) & Integrated Sensing (IS).

Throughout his career, Wemekamp was recognized as pre-eminent authority in strategic planning, technical vision and innovation, marketing and business development, and in acquisition leadership.

Key contributions:

• As a member of the VMEbus Manufacturers Group, actively supported development of Revision B of the VMEbus specification in 1982, and then following the beginning of VITA, supporting creation of VITA 1014 and in later years VPX
• VMEbus technical standards promotion through presentations at the BUSCON Bus/Board Users Show and Conferences (during late 80s), numerous articles published in trade magazines endorsing VMEbus, particularly for rugged applications, and representing Dy 4 Systems technology road show presentations at systems integrators worldwide
• Industry voice in influencing worldwide aerospace & defense systems integrators and their military end customers to accept the benefits of commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) and leverage the growing COTS industrial base of companies, to offer reduced life cycle ownership costs and faster technology deployment of embedded computing systems, for the benefits of all warfighters

Very few people contribute so passionately to their interests as Joe Pavlat. He loved flying his plane, driving his Porsche, hiking, writing, and traveling. He is honored for his passion of industry computing and his contribution as role of president of the PCI Industrial Computer Manufacturers Group. Pavlat was the first, and only president until his death in September of 2016.

Pavlat started down the path of becoming a physicist while studying at the University of Wisconsin in Madison before graduating with a B.S. degree in Engineering in 1975. He started his professional career as a hardware engineer honing his technology expertise of motion control and robotic systems.

Pro-Log Corp. brought him onboard in 1989 to lead their marketing efforts of STD bus. He never strayed far from engineering where he also held roles in engineering management, guiding the development of hardware products.

Pro-Log was a primary contributor to the development of CompactPCI, which was mapped out as the future for STD bus. Pavlat was deeply involved from the beginning. When it looked like a standard was emerging, he participated in forming PICMG in 1994. He was directly involved in the development of both the CompactPCI and AdvancedTCA standards.

He stayed actively connected to physics by participating in experiments in Antarctica and on top of the Haleakala volcano in Hawaii. Pavlat also volunteered his time flying for the Monterey Sheriff’s department Aero Squadron.

Pavlat’s passion for writing and all things PICMG made for a perfect partnership with OpenSystems Media where he served as Editorial Director for several PICMG publications.

Key contributions:

• President of PICMG
• VITA Board of Directors
• Evangelist for open standards

As VMEbus became the industrial bus of choice in the 1980s, the standard IC moved from a 20-pin MSI DIP to a VLSI high pin count surface mount device. Although the functionality of standard boards increased dramatically, the average selling price remained at about $2500. This high per-slot cost prompted manufacturers to continue to place as much functionality on each board as possible, to keep the total slot and total system costs as low as possible. This trend increased the basic functionality granularity (the smallest purchasable function) 10 to 50 fold. It was no longer practical to purchase separately a small number of serial lines or a small amount of memory. Many manufacturers attempted to remedy this problem by offering proprietary “daughter modules” for their processor boards. At least 20 different such proprietary offerings were on the market by the end of the 1980s.

At this time, GreenSpring Computers, under the technical direction of Kim Rubin, created a module with the specific design and intent that it become an open, widely accepted standard. GreenSpring Computers introduced the module and its specification as an open standard at BUSCON in 1988.

When the modules were introduced, GreenSpring incorporated features that were found in only a few, if any, other modules:

• Up to four modules fit on one VME or PC-AT board, for high modularity
• Bus and processor independent; supported both Motorola and Intel byte ordering
• Simple, synchronous interface made Modules and Carriers easy to design
• Rugged mechanical mounting, for ease of use and high reliability
• Defined ID space for configuration management
• Low cost

The concept caught on, and by 1994 over 80 companies were designing and offering products to this standard, on at least seven standard buses. GreenSpring called their modules “IndustryPacks®,” but each manufacturer was free to use whatever trade name they wished. The term “IP Modules” is commonly used, a term that is now in the public domain.

In 1991, the Motorola Computer Group incorporated the IP Module specification into its 68040 based MVME162, implementing four IP Module positions in a single VME slot. This helped propel the acceptance of the specification.

At the start of 1994 a formal standards committee, VITA 4, was put together under the VITA Standards Organization, which had received accreditation as a standards organization under ANSI. Most of the committee’s work was done via internet, a new concept at the time, which proved effective. The purpose of the committee was to validate and clarify the existing specification. In particular, timing details for 32 MHz and DMA operation were clarified. Also, the specification was reformatted, with numbering added for easier reference and formality. The ANSI/VITA 4-1995 (S2011) IP Modules standard is still available.

[Image IP-MP Serial: Industry Pack, Courtesy of Abaco Systems]

“Hello - VITA, this is Lollie,” is what you heard when you called VITA. Lollie Wheeler was the voice answering the VITA phone for most of 30 years. Lollie was employee number three at VITA. She was good friends with Betty, who was in search of some assistance with the rapidly growing organization. Lollie immediately jumped in helping with whatever needed to be done.

The first edition of the VITA VMEbus Compatible Products Directory was published in 1985. 174 companies and more than 2,700 products were listed in that first edition. Lollie was the go-to person for this new VITA product directory. This directory was printed four times per year; with all the new products and companies joining the VMEbus boom, there was plenty of work to be done with each edition. Collecting inputs and vetting each of them was a tireless task carried out by Lollie with each edition. Eventually the printed directory went paperless on the emerging internet where VITA was an early pioneer. When the directory went on-line the quarterly printed publishing became obsolete. However there still remained much to be done as each entry had to be approved, updates made to the database, and members reminded to keep their content fresh.

The staff grew, leadership changed, and Lollie emerged as the behind-the-scenes manager of VITA. Members knew her as the go to person for questions about memberships and dues, product directory inputs and changes, assistance in obtaining copies of specifications, and any other miscellaneous requests that came her way. Lollie followed each request to its satisfactory conclusion, never leaving items unresolved.

Lollie managed the accounting, responded to requests for VITA standards, and scheduled countless VITA Standards Organization (VSO) meetings. Lollie kept a very low profile, but she has had her finger on the pulse of the organization throughout the years. Behind the scenes she ensured that the member dues were collected, which could be a full-time job in itself. She made sure that standards were delivered anywhere in the world. And that the VSO meetings ran smoothly. Coordinating the logistics for six VSO meetings each year in hotels all over the country was a challenge with all the conditions that hotels put on achieving your numbers for the meetings, let alone ensuring that all the attendees are satisfied.

Ray Alderman frequently referred to John Rynearson as the “Brains” of VITA, himself as the “Muscle”, and Lollie as the “Heart”. Anyone that has ever had the opportunity to engage with Lollie will certainly agree with that analogy.

Robles is a retired Boeing Senior Technical Fellow with over thirty years of experience in electronic packaging disciplines including system architectures, hardware design for commercial and military ground and airborne avionics, mechanical tolerance analysis, thermal and dynamic/vibration analysis, weights/mass properties analysis, design of experiments, environmental analysis and test, reliability, and environmental stress screening.

He is a recognized expert on the application of commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware on military platforms. Robles led the ITAA working group for EIA-933 Standard for Preparing a COTS Assembly Management Plan. He was the Boeing Focal for VITA and PICMG, developing open standards for next generation COTS assemblies for military/aerospace applications.

Robles’ technical leadership in VITA drove the development of standards and COTS VPX products that are compatible with two-level maintenance. He led the implementation team that established a two-level maintenance baseline on FCS resulting in projected life cycle cost savings of $4 billion for the ICS alone.

His development of a practicable liquid flow-through cooling design resulted in a 30 percent weight and volume reduction in the F/A-18 E/F active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar processor. His led a multi-company team to develop a mission systems design that the customer regarded as “nearly flawless.”

Robles received a Special Incentive Award for the $50 million projected savings from the application of his approach for the integration of COTS electronics on AWCS Extend Sentry hardware. He is a prolific consultant who has been involved with many Boeing programs including 787, 737 RS, AWACS, F-15, F/A-18, F/A-22, FCS, P-8, V-22, and WedgeTail.

Robles was the Boeing Fellowship focal for Communities of Practice and Knowledge Management. He presented well-received workshops at the University of California at Berkeley, WSU, and at Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers National Technical Career Conferences.

Parsons was a long-time participant in the VITA Standards Organization (VSO). He participated in countless working groups over his twenty-plus years of contributions, extending all the way back to the original VMEbus standard. He was the chair of the VITA 30.x (2mm Connector Practice for Eurocard Systems) working group. Parsons was the chairman of the VSO for nine years. During his tenure, VITA adopted new ex ante patent terms for its members, setting a new high-bar for standards development organizations. It was also during his years that VPX became the mainstay activity for the VSO.

In 1996, Parsons joined the VITA board of directors as the representative for AMP who had just become a sponsor member. He was involved in many changes that VITA experienced in those years, as the charter expanded from VMEbus to include other technologies important to the critical embedded computing industry.

Connector technology is the root of many of the standards developed by VITA, Parsons’ background in the connector industry was key to his contributions to the many standards he was involved in during his career. After graduating with an aerospace engineering degree and working in that industry for seven years, Parsons moved to AMP as a product engineer and later as the Harrisburg liaison for AMP Packaging Systems. In 1988, he moved to AMP Standards and Approvals department as a Standards Development Manager where he was a key contributor to dozens of VITA standards. He also participated in PICMG, IEEE, SFF, SCSI, and other standards activities, continuing after the merger with Tyco Electronics and Foxconn until his retirement in 2010.

With more than 30 years in the embedded computer industry, Warren Andrews combined his engineering, marketing, and journalistic skills to identify and analyze leading-edge technologies and trends. His participation in the embedded computing industry in all of his roles inspired many to greater heights. His many articles and market analysis provided insight into this emerging part of the computer industry.

Andrews was the editorial director and publisher/associate publisher of RTC magazine, a highly respected monthly magazine in the embedded-computer industry. He also founded COTS Journal, a leading publication in the military/government electronics market.

Prior to joining the RTC Group, Andrews worked with Computer Design, Electronic Design, and EE Times in various capacities including to his own newsletter, InfoBus Report, which he published for over 10 years. In addition, he published several marketing/technology studies including landmark volumes on the “Bus and Board Market,” and “PCI, its Markets and Technology.”

Before joining the fourth estate in 1980, Andrews owned his own engineering and manufacturing company where he designed microprocessor-based switching systems for the retail and lodging industries. He is also the developer of several unique products for the security and automotive industries and holds a U.S. Patent for one of his inventions.

Andrews has been the keynote speaker at the PCI SIG annual meeting, a regular speaker at the annual Bus and Board Conference and was often invited to participate at company-specific events with companies that include Motorola, Wind River Systems, and Zilinx.

Andrews was on the Board of Directors of SBS Technologies and the board of advisers of StarGen, Inc.

Lyman Hevle was the founding executive director of the VMEbus International Trade Association (VITA). He held that role from its inception in 1984 until 1993. During his career Lym was focused on the business and market growth of VMEbus. He passed away in January 2016, and his legacy will live on in the industry. Lym's own words best describe his involvement with VMEbus and how he came to be the founding executive director of VITA.

Read More about Lym in his own words:
(including excerpt from Lym's autobiography)

Like any successful human endeavor, there are many who claim fatherhood. There were actually many true and some untrue claimants. Some of these came aboard the VMEbus train several years after it had left the station. They did, however, fulfill a valuable role as VMEbus pioneers. The actual birth of VMEbus was painful, though exciting. I will relate my role as accurately as I can, with no purpose of denigrating anyone else’s memory or participation.

It starts with the [Motorola] 6800 microprocessor and the Exercisor. In those days every manufacturer designed their own non-standard boards and guarded them zealously. The engineers who established the Exercisor board parameters did a good job with a fairly small board. When we started Microsystems, we inherited this head start. We immediately saw that the same boards that we would develop for the Exercisor could fit nicely in a commercial computer system business. We gleefully developed a prodigious 5-year plan to launch this business. Our plan was to furnish the systems hardware and systems software, limited to operating system and languages. We had already lined up independent established distributors who would handle sales and service and develop user application software. A marriage made in heaven.

Glenn Iaggi (our boss), Dick Ruth, and I made a triumphant trip to Shaumberg to excite the brass with our creativity. All the brass was there. About halfway into our presentations, Motorola President John Mitchell abruptly stopped us and told us we were computer retreads who would diminish his base business profits. He strongly stated that Motorola would never be in the computer business. We protested that Motorola was already in the revolutionary computer business by virtue of the microprocessors. When I asked him if there was no place for creative people who could lead Motorola into the future, he said there wasn’t. We packed up our papers in complete defeat and left the boardroom. We really didn’t know if we had been fired or not. We weren’t. Bob Galvin would visit us quite often for our “Moments of Madness” looks into the future, and told us he understood us and appreciated our forward thinking. We partially satisfied our longings by offering our Exercisor as an end-use system in the process automation market. It wasn’t a good fit and our success was modest at best.

The 68000 series came along, and our expansion desires were rekindled. Our Microsystems engineers designed the EXORmacs development system. Max Loesel (our Europe Manager) made me aware of the European developing standard called Eurocards. It came in single, double, and triple widths. I argued for this approach. I lost because of strongly stated engineering requirements and distaste for anything European at that time. Another reason was that engineers from the large computer businesses were used to big boards. There was no way we could sell these big VERSAbus modules in the process automation market. Max, however, didn’t give up. His engineers retrofitted the VERSAbus onto double Eurocards in his Munich “skunk works.” He kept me up-to-date and even took me to see some of his prospective customers. I was hooked, and the result was called Versa Module Europe. Its acronym became “VME.”

There was a certain NIH feeling in Phoenix and a little “we/they” animosity. I was delighted with the VMEbus market prospects because of not only its size, but also more importantly because it was a standard that other manufacturers could use. The trick now was to get management acceptance and approval. On a trip to the Shaumberg Corporate Planning, I explained that with VMEbus we could catch Intel, whose Multibus II was quickly gobbling up the market. The next idea was that if we shared the VMEbus with other manufacturers, we would swamp the market with VMEbus boards and bury Intel. Sharing a standard technology was something Intel would never consider. Just then John Mitchell looked in and said these two ideas were stupid. His rationale was:

1. You have already spent a ton of money developing VERSAbus. Why spend it again just changing the size?
2. You have spent a lot of money developing the technology. Why on earth would you want to give it away?

I told him the KOA Camp story. Will we settle for 100 percent of a small piece of the pie, or get rich with a smaller percentage of a gigantic pie? He reiterated that computer retreads were dangerous. He didn’t say no, so I took it as tacit approval. Motorola Microsystems embraced the concepts. We sent Jim Gunderson to explore the cooperation concept with Philips/Signetics and United Technologies [key 68000 supporters], and they were ecstatic. Thus began a series of meetings to determine which company would build which boards to share with each other. This entire group spent a lot of time with attorneys to make sure we avoided any anti-trust situations.

Philips/Signetics jumped on board and designed some boards. Time went slowly by with modest results. Management changes were made at the Corporate and Semiconductor levels. Dick Ruth was fired and this troubled me greatly. I was asked if I wanted to be interviewed for his job and I quickly declined. The new Microsystems manager knew nothing of our dream. New blood was inserted into Microsystems who I felt were nice guys but incompetent to lead Microsystems to any creative new heights. They had zero marketing and/or business acumen. Yes, I was totally disillusioned with Motorola. I told my new boss that I was going to leave Motorola but I would stay long enough to produce a comprehensive five-year plan to launch VMEbus into the process automation business. This had been my background with General Electric. I told him I would do it with Shaumberg Planning cooperation and management approval. I knew enough from our failures with top management to omit any land mines. For example, I would never mention computer systems, but rather call them “process controllers.”

The plan was completed, but I felt little understood by the new Microsystems. I left Motorola and joined Dick Ruth with GEC of England. They were developing a super mini-computer and needed some marketing and business planning. A few years later I got a call from Jim Gunderson of Microsystems, saying that VMEbus was going nowhere, and did I have any ideas to get it moving? I said I would do an international study if the three VMEbus principals would foot the bill. They pledged about $300,000 and hired me. I listened and made speeches all over the United States and Europe. I painted an alluring picture of a business that could inure to one billion dollars in five years (and it did). The response was a standing ovation in each location. They each wanted a longer private meeting. This we did, and the results were stunning. They all wanted a piece of a new VMEbus adventure.

The resulting consulting report was easy for me to write because my previously conceived ideas were validated. I presented the report to Motorola, Philips/Signetics, and United Technologies in Las Vegas. All three companies eagerly accepted the formation of an International VMEbus Trade Association … hence VITA was born. The report covered the structure of VITA and how it would operate in detail.

The next step in the report was to hire an executive director. It was decided that each company would produce a candidate. Each candidate would visit each company, which would result in an appointment. Motorola voted for me, but the others had some reservations. They had two concerns about me. One was that I had been an employee of Motorola and might be biased. The other was that I had a reputation as an entrepreneur and owned several outside businesses. I told each that I admired Motorola very much, but had left them two years ago with much disappointment. On the question of allocation of my time, I said I would write a binding contract to limit my outside activities. I said VITA would be my burning passion, and that if I had nothing else, I had integrity. I was hired and started immediately.

The starting point was selling VITA membership in several classifications according to the plan. This went extremely well, and we then developed the Compatible Products Directory (CPD), VITA Journal, Mailing Lists, et al. We also published the VMEbus specification, as well as a VMEbus technical design manual. We held technical seminars and participated in shows all over the world. We established a very successful VITA office in Europe with brilliant Zoltan Hunor as director. We also had satellite offices in Tokyo and Moscow. We were able to get the U.S. Navy to standardize on VMEbus, then the Army and Air Force. Soon all the world’s military forces followed suit. A major accomplishment was the reduction of Intel’s percentage of the market from 95 percent to zero. They eventually discontinued their Multibus II board operations. Mission accomplished. I retired in 1995 and have not followed the progress of VITA or the VMEbus since then. VITA was the high point of my professional life, and I am eternally grateful to the very many fathers and pioneers of VMEbus.

Q&A with Lyman Hevle ("Coopetition" yields VME's success, 2006)

VMEbus:  What were you guys thinking around the time that VMEbus first came into existence?

HEVLE: The 68000 [processor] series came along and our expansion desires were rekindled. Max Loesel, our Europe manager at Motorola, made me aware of a developing European standard called Eurocards. They came in single, double, and triple widths. I liked what I saw, and I argued for this approach. I lost because of strongly stated engineering requirements and distaste for anything European at that time. Another reason was that large computer businesses were used to big boards like VERSAmodules. But there was no way we could sell these big VERSAbus modules in the process automation market. Max, however, didn’t give up. His engineers retrofitted the VERSAbus onto double EUROcards in his Munich “skunk works.” He kept me up to date and even took me to see some of his prospective customers. I was hooked, and the result was called Versa Module Europe and its acronym became VME.

VMEbus: What were some of the high and low points in the original VMEbus development?

HEVLE: At a Motorola corporate planning session, I explained that with VMEbus we could catch Intel, whose MULTIbus II was quickly gobbling up the market. The next idea was that if we shared the VMEbus with other manufacturers, we would swamp the market with VMEbus boards and bury Intel. Sharing a standard technology was something Intel would never consider. We never did get strong management acceptance and approval, but we pressed on.

We sent Jim Gunderson to explore the cooperation concept with Philips/Signetics and United Technologies, and they were ecstatic. Thus began a series of meetings to determine which company would build which boards to share with each other. This entire group spent a lot of time with attorneys to make sure we avoided any antitrust situations. Philips/Signetics jumped onboard and designed some boards.

[Editor’s note: this spirit of “co-opetition” (cooperating while competing) remains to this day part of the successful VME culture. Competitors work together to create VME standards, then go and compete in the marketplace.]

VMEbus: After 25 years, how has this turned out?

HEVLE: We established a very successful VMEbus International Trade Association (VITA). We were able to get the U.S. Navy to standardize on VMEbus, then the Army and Air Force. Soon many of the world’s military forces followed suit. A major accomplishment was the reduction of Intel’s percentage of the market from 95 percent to 0. They eventually discontinued their MULTIbus II board operations. “Mission accomplished.”

VMEbus: What do you think the next 25 years will hold?

HEVLE: I retired in 1995 and have not followed the progress of VITA or the VMEbus since then. VITA was the high point of my professional life and I am eternally grateful to the very many pioneers of VMEbus.

Key Contributions

• 1984-1993: Founding Executive Director, VMEbus International Trade Association (VITA)

Induction: July 2015

ANSI/VITA 1.5-2003 (R2009) (2eSST) is an extension of the ANSI/VITA 1-1994, VME64, and ANSI/VITA 1.1-1997, VME64x standards. It defines a transfer protocol based upon source-synchronous concepts that permits the VMEbus to operate at rates to at least 320 MBps. As technology improves, this rate can be extended to higher levels. The 2eSST specification emerged out of the MBLT and 2eVME concepts that extended the performance of VMEbus data transfers. Figure 2 compares the VME64 and 2eSST standards.

Thales Computers designed the Alma2e bridge supporting the 2eSST protocol in 2002. Tundra Semiconductor, working with Motorola, brought the Tsi148 PCI/X-to-VME2eSST bridge to market in 2004, making the 2eSST protocol available to the entire industry. Concepts exist to enhance VME2eSST that could increase performance to more than 1 GBps.

The 2eSST protocol requires low skew between signals and monotonic rising and falling edges on the signals. To meet these requirements, limited length backplanes, special backplane topologies, and/or enhanced transceivers are required. The specification calls for enhanced bus transceivers with controlled rise and fall times, tightly defined thresholds, low part to part skew, and low-voltage transistor-transistor logic (LVTTL) levels. During the development of this standard, specific transceivers were developed to meet these requirements.

As a source-synchronous protocol, the performance of 2eSST is determined not by the propagation delay from source to destination, but by skew – the variation in propagation delay through the drivers, backplane, and receivers. As the skew decreases, system bandwidth can increase. In theory, a source-synchronous protocol is virtually unlimited in its potential transfer rate. This standard provides for transfer rates of 160, 267, and 320 MBps with a 21-slot backplane. New transfer rates can be defined as the technology improves.

In developing the 2eSST protocol, several important objectives were considered:

• Maximize performance: Performance was the driving impetus for this new protocol. To meet this objective, the protocol was designed to ensure that all devices involved in the transfer would operate as fast as possible.
• Minimize complexity: The 2eSST protocol was designed to minimize the amount of logic that would be required to implement the protocol.
• Minimize application limits: The 2eSST protocol can be used in 3U, 6U, and 9U environments.
• Maintain compatibility: The 2eSST protocol was designed to be compatible with legacy VMEbus products.

Key Contributions

• 2003: 2eSST (ANSI/VITA 1.5) – Defines VME protocol that allows data transfers up to 320 MBps.