Thanks Mich, Quiet enlightening i must admit, i wonder what is going to happen with all this mergers and acquisitions in the data market, lets adopt a wait and see attitude to see what happens in 2010. Regards On Wed, Dec 30, 2009 at 4:27 PM, Michuki Mwangi <michuki@swiftkenya.com>wrote:
Hi Barrack,
Speaking for self; let me try and explain some of the factors that trigger the establishment of IXPs. (am intentionally staying clear off the issue and instead providing background to hopefully enrich the follow-up discussions)
1) Cost of transit - if there's always going to be a high cost of buying transit capacity (buying access to other networks). This is often what we call buying upstream service from an international service provider
2) More than 3 ISPs in a market - If there's more than 3 providers in one market, it makes economic sense to bring down their costs by exchanging traffic destined to each in a place thats within their control and not controlled by their upstream provider. Most upstream providers wont give you a local and international bill for traffic exchange. If there are two providers, direct interconnects would be sufficient.
3) Open Other opportunities - Content hosting, content delivery and content creation will most often take root if theres a local market. IXPs serve as a local market where folks with content can access eyeballs at "peering" costs. Peering is often referred to as exchange of traffic between two networks at no fee.
If the cost of transit is lower than that of peering and there are less than 3 providers in a market, the economic benefit of an IXP will be negligible.
The question here is; what triggers more than one IXP in a market and whats defines the market boundary. IMHO the market boundary is often defined by the cost of leasing circuits. For instance the point where the cost of leasing a circuit of 1mbps from one point to another within a certain radius point A is often value X, beyond to radius point B the cost is value Y hence radius point A boundary is the market boundary.
Having defined the market boundary and a prime example is Nairobi, would be worth to start the discussion on what would trigger having more than 1 IXP.
At this stage, its worth getting to know that there are two main types of IXPs i.e non-profit and commercial IXPs. In addition, its important to know that ISPs' have is called peering policies. The peering policies basically define the rules of engagement for members at the IXP. The most common one are bilateral or multi-lateral peering policy. In bilateral it means each member will have to negotiate with every member at an IXP (IXP is not involved) in order to establish peering. In a multi-lateral it means every member is subject to the same peering policy i.e peer with everyone at the IXP. As you may have guessed it the bilateral peering is most popular and preferred peering policy at most IXPs. This allows for ISPs to selectively decide whom to peer with.
As a result, in any market there are small and large players. The large players have the ability to selectively decide whom to peer with will leads to the small players buying transit from the large players. Since the cost of transit is often higher than that of peering, other IXPs will emerge to cater for those who cannot easily fit into the existing IXP. The key aspect for this new IXP will be the peering policy in place to attract membership. The new IXP can also take the shape of commercial or non-profit.
Please take a look at www.pch.net and see how dense IXPs are in Europe. Some cities like Paris and London have more than 1 IXP operated by different organizations or competing IXPs and both commercial and non-profit.
Consequently, IXPs in different markets are never directly interconnected and for this very same reason, competing IXPs in the same market would not be interconnected. As a result, its common to find an ISP participating in IXPs in different markets i.e in Nairobi and in London and also in other competing IXPs in the same market. For an ISP the more they can peer the lower their costs.
Countries like South Africa have more than one IXP in different markets i.e one in Jburg, another in Grahamstown, and the recently re-established Capetown IXP. Other countries have many players (large and small) and with lots of content being created in those markets having more than one IXP is often feasible each attracting a different group of ISPs based on their peering policies.
In conclusion, the key point to remember is that an IXP will remain viable if its able to reduce the cost of delivering packets from one network from another. If its expensive then the cost of delivering packets from one network to another will be same as transit costs and therefore diminish its own value. Unless the IXP is providing access to premium content that would otherwise be accessible via transit costs its less likely to attract membership. Lastly, an IXP is just a Switch. The question to have in mind is what attracts folks to come connect to your switch where there are more than one.
I hope that gives sufficient background and info to enrich this discussion further.
Regards,
Michuki.
Barrack Otieno wrote:
Listers,
I was going through an article in the East African standard with the above mentioned title by the CEO of KIXP published on Sunday Dec 2009 in the East African Standard, am wondering is there a business case other than the security considerations highlighted that justifies the GIXP and if we could be allowed to access it or is it classified info?, in addition the writer has mentioned the Strengths of KIXP however i would also appreciate to know the weaknesses since they might justify the need for GIXP bearing in mind the fact that we are just coming out of the woods in so far as monopolies are concerned as i try to digest the article in any case having gone through http://www.bgp4.as/internet-exchanges it is evident there are a few developed countries with more that one Exchange point eg South Africa , the US, Sweden, Singapore, Russia and the UK, somebody educate me.
Regards
-- Barrack O. Otieno Administrative Manager Afriregister Ltd (Ke) P.o.Box 21682 Nairobi 00100 Tel: +254721325277 +254733206359 +254202498789 Riara Road, Bamboo Lane www.afriregister.com <http://www.afriregister.com> www.afriregister.co.ke <http://www.afriregister.co.ke> ICANN accredited registrar. Skype: barrack.otieno
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-- Barrack O. Otieno Administrative Manager Afriregister Ltd (Ke) P.o.Box 21682 Nairobi 00100 Tel: +254721325277 +254733206359 +254202498789 Riara Road, Bamboo Lane www.afriregister.com www.afriregister.co.ke ICANN accredited registrar. Skype: barrack.otieno