Sub-Microsecond Switch Goes into Testing
September 4, 2012
Zeptonics, a Sydney-based financial technology firm, said clients had begun testing its trading switch, which routes messages inside high-speed data centers in 130 nanoseconds.
“Their insights will help us to fine-tune the management interface and to ensure optimal connectivity with a number of popular exchanges,’’ said principal Josha Rose.
The multiplexer is designed to funnel messages from many downstream ‘’nodes” into a single stream of data and then back again, as rapidly as possible.
ZeptoMux
It operates at 10 gigabits a second in data transfer speeds and funnels 23 streams into one. The 24-port single rack unit is expected to be available commercially in September.
Last October, Cisco Systems said commercially introduced a switch that can route trading messages through its circuitry and back out onto a wire in under one microsecond.
Cisco, whose gear is used by the Nasdaq OMX Group and other exchange operators, said its Nexus 3016 switch can get the last number or letter of a 1,024-character message onto a wire in 1.17 microseconds, or millionths of a second. The last number or letter of a 256-character message makes it onto the wire in 950 nanoseconds, or billionths of a second.
The switch is Cisco’s first in a series that now can move data at the rate of 40 billion bits a second. That is a four-fold leap from the previous standard of 10 billion bits a second.
Next planned out of the Zeptonics lab will be the ZeptoLink, a 50-port layer 1 device with a latency of around 5 nanoseconds.
This electronic patch panel will be used for broadcasting market data, publishing volatilities, reconfiguring connections and performing other time-critical tasks in trading.
