Solarflare`s Solarstorm vNIC with 29West`s LBM Achieves Sub-20-Microsecond, Infiniband-Like Latency over 10 Gigabit Ethernet

Multi-Vendor Testing Conducted by Securities Technology Analysis Center (STAC)
Shows Dramatic Improvement in Messaging Latency with Ethernet
IRVINE, Calif.--(Business Wire)--
Solarflare Communications, the leader in standards-based 10 Gigabit Ethernet
(10GbE) silicon, and 29West, Inc., the market leader in high-performance,
low-latency messaging solutions, today announced results of a multi-vendor test
at STAC. The report found that the Solarstorm vNIC, in conjunction with 29West`s
Latency Busters Messaging (LBM), achieves sub-20-microsecond, Infiniband-like
latency over 10GbE in a one-way latency test, while sustaining target message
rates up to 125,000 messages per second (msg/sec). This latency was also very
deterministic with less than 6 microseconds of standard deviation (jitter). The
testing, which used UDP multicast, accomplished message throughput up to 550,000
msg/sec and 4.51 Gigabit per second with a single sender.

STAC measured the performance of messaging middleware based on 29West`s LBM with
Solarflare SFE4002 10 Gigabit NICs and a Cisco Catalyst 4900M 10 Gigabit switch.
The test platform used servers and processors typically found in use by
financial firms today. Read more about the report at
http://www.stacresearch.com/node/4967.

Jack Gidding, associate director at STAC said, "Using servers commonly deployed
at securities firms, this Ethernet-based solution delivered low latency and low
jitter in an unmodified middleware application. This is significant because
improving performance without requiring costly application modifications is very
attractive to today`s financial firms."

Enabling financial trading customers to implement highly predictable systems,
Solarflare`s 10GbE solutions provide a competitive advantage and offer increased
overall speeds, more accurate trading and higher profits. Now, financial firms
can use off-the-shelf Ethernet, TCP/IP, UDP and multicast solutions to
accelerate market data systems without requiring the implementation of new wire
protocols or changing applications. By leveraging the Solarstorm vNIC with
OpenOnload, IT managers are able to build market data delivery systems designed
to handle increasing message rates, while reducing message latency and jitter
between servers.

Application latency and throughput are crucial decision factors for financial
firms when designing their market data trading networks. The STAC test results
prove that a 10GbE infrastructure that includes Cisco's Catalyst 4900M is
capable of delivering high message rates while consistently maintaining
low-latency. The Cisco Catalyst 4900M is recognized in the industry as a
best-in-class multicast switch with one of the lowest packet latencies on the
market.

"In the electronic trading markets, firms can profit from as little as one
microsecond of advantage over competitors. This drives organizations to find
microsecond-level optimizations of the systems fueling their trades," said Bruce
Tolley, vice president of corporate marketing at Solarflare. "With our vNIC and
OpenOnload technology, off-the-shelf 10GbE hardware can be used as the
foundation of messaging systems for electronic trading with no need to re-write
applications or use proprietary, specialized hardware."

"We were very impressed by the significant contribution Solarflare`s Solarstorm
vNIC with OpenOnload provided to application performance," said Gregory Lorence,
head of product management and marketing at 29West. "Based on the STAC testing,
this is the lowest latency and highest throughput NIC we have ever seen."

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About Solarflare 10GbE Products

Solarflare designs and develops the industry`s highest-performing, lowest-power,
standards-compliant 10GbE vNIC controllers and 10GBASE-T transceivers. Optimized
for all key virtualization platforms including Citrix, Microsoft and VMware,
Solarflare`s Solarstorm Ethernet controller with OpenOnload consumes less than 2
watts at full line-rate performance delivering the optimal balance in
performance and power efficiency. At 5 watts, Solarflare`s 10Xpress 10GBASE-T
PHY with dynamic power scaling is the lowest power PHY in the industry and
supports distances of greater than 100 meters on UTP Category 6A cabling, 100
meters on STP Category 6, 55 meters on UTP Category 6 and 45 meters on UTP
Category 5E cabling. For additional product information and pricing, send a
request to productinfo@solarflare.com.

About Solarflare

Solarflare Communications is a semiconductor company delivering the next level
of high-performance 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE). As the leading provider of
standards-compliant 10GbE silicon, Solarflare`s robust and power-efficient
solutions are cost effective and easy to deploy. Ready for primetime, Solarflare
10 Gigabit Ethernet makes possible next-generation applications such cloud
computing, server virtualization, network convergence and low latency UDP
multicast (with OpenOnload) for market data applications. The privately held
company is headquartered in Irvine, California, with a development center in
Cambridge, UK, and has announced relationships with Accton, Citrix, Delta
Networks Inc, Panduit, SMC Networks and VMware.

ABOUT 29West

29West is the leader in high-performance, low-latency messaging solutions for
financial institutions. Their Ultra Messaging family of products provides up to
a 10X latency reduction and 100X bandwidth improvement over traditional
messaging designs across a wide range of use cases, including streaming,
persistence, caching, queuing and desktop distribution. 29West provides their
customers with the highest-performing, most tunable, most controllable, most
powerful messaging API in the industry, and allows full end-to-end monitoring
capabilities. With more than 130 production deployments since 2004 and offices
in Chicago, New York, London and Tokyo, 29West provides enterprise strength,
enterprise wide messaging. For more information, visit http://www.29west.com.

All product and company names herein may be trademarks of their registered
owners.

LEWIS PR for Solarflare
Amy Robinson / Katie Eakins
619-677-2700
solarflare@lewispr.com
or
29West, Inc.
Jennifer Griffin
630-836-2990
jgriffin@29west.com

Copyright Business Wire 2009