An open hardware network-focused ASIC would be cool, but cost and long development times would likely be limiting factors. If you wanted to explore this further, starting with FPGA-based router components would be a good starting point. For example:

https://github.com/open-sdr/openwifi

Thanks :) Yeah, the router is defiantly further in the future to, as it additionally requires CPU integration for run the software stack, switches are the first order of business.

Can I do a "hold my beer" moment ? https://github.com/Essenceia/ethernet_switch_asic