Who makes nvlink copper spine / backplane cartridges for AI data centers

NVLink copper spine and backplane cartridges are the physical layer under the scale-up fabric of 3.01, wiring GPU compute trays to NVLink switch trays inside a rack — the taxonomy notes roughly 5,000 copper cables in an NVL72-class rack. That cable count is itself the reason the industry is evaluating co-packaged optics (3.08) as a replacement at the next speed generation: as per-GPU bandwidth rises, all-copper backplanes start running into reach and density limits that pushing more copper doesn't solve. Several connector and cable assembly makers supply this content, generally under reference-design partner arrangements with the rack architect rather than as a fully open market. An investor should watch this layer as a bellwether for the copper-to-optical transition inside the rack: continued growth in cable count per rack favors incumbent copper suppliers, while an early shift to CPO would cap that growth sooner than volume trends alone would suggest.