Metamako, provider of the world’s fastest, deterministic, ultra-low latency devices for the trading, exchanges and telco communities, has today announced the launch of a new device, MetaMux 48. The next-generation, 48-port device lowers latency by 20% and has a greater number of ports. It is more than twice as fast as the best-performing conventional switches, with a latency for aggregation of just 82 nanoseconds. Critically, as with all other Metamako devices, the new switch has a high degree of determinism compared to traditional switches.

The new device brings more flexibility, allowing a larger number of trading applications to take advantage of the technology by having a higher port count. This is the first device from Metamako to leverage Altera’s FPGA technology. As with Metamako’s other FPGA-based devices, firms that wish to develop their own logic in an FPGA can significantly simplify FPGA development, compared to the traditional approach. Using a complete stand-alone applications platform reduces the components, complexity and overall cost of FPGA development projects.

Dr. Dave Snowdon, founder and CTO of Metamako, says: “This device offers impressively low latency between, for example, a trading application and an exchange. Its port count and flexibility make it the perfect choice for connecting to algo-trading servers, trading services and long-range links. I’m really pleased to add yet another groundbreaking device to our existing range. Our ongoing innovation and investment in R&D mean that we continue to innovate and stay ahead of the curve. This is of enormous benefit to our clients who can smoothly migrate to ever more sophisticated and flexible devices, built on the same tried-and-tested core technology which has been allowing traders to lower their latency since 2013.” He adds: “We continue to eliminate the barriers between firms and the technology they need to compete.”

In 2014 STAC benchmarked Metamako’s MetaConnect 16, showing that the (mean per-hop) latency of the switch was undetectable at a rate of 100,000 messages/second and was only 4 nanoseconds at 600,000 messages/ second. In 2015 the STAC benchmark of MetaApp measured the full round-trip latency of the device at only 120 nanoseconds.