I've speculated it's the patents on 10G over copper holding us back. IIRC we're just about at the point where the early over fiber modes are off patent in the

I've speculated it's the patents on 10G over copper holding us back. IIRC we're just about at the point where the early over fiber modes are off patent in the US. However the 10G (over copper) encoding format uses a complex forward error correction encoding that is a bit energy intensive, it also adds some latency. A smaller silicon production node and this being used outside of SERIOUSLY EXPENSIVE for pro-sumers / medium businesses would instigate a drop via commodity.