Through their DE-CIX as a Service (DaaS) partner model, DE-CIX intends to develop interconnection platforms across Africa. As a first step on the continent, DE-CIX has formed strategic partnerships with several African companies in different countries.
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DE-CIX has begun collaborations with the Rack Centre data center in Lagos, Nigeria, as well as with the ISP and hosting provider UNITED S.A. in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), to establish the Africa Congo Internet Exchange (ACIX), and with the Libyan International Telecom Company (LITC) in Tripoli, to host the Africa Cloud Interconnection Exchange (AF-CIX).
By the end of 2022, all three new African platforms should be operational, bringing international capabilities and next-generation interconnection services, including cloud connectivity, to their respective markets.
The partners will also use their own infrastructure to expand the coverage of their platforms to new territories, bringing the total number of African countries covered to nine – in addition to the three home markets, coverage will also include Cameroon, Congo, the Republic of Central Africa, Chad, Niger, and Sudan.
The DE-CIX-as-a-Service initiative provides data center operators and other third parties with a turnkey solution for operating an interconnection fabric and developing a connectivity ecosystem. DE-CIX intends to expand its presence on the African continent in 2022 and beyond, with new facilities in various areas and metro centers.
Interconnection Services Africa
With this announcement, DE-CIX now has a total of 12 interconnection platforms operating and announced on the DaaS model, joining success stories like ‘UAE-IX powered by DE-CIX’ in Dubai and ‘SEE-CIX powered by DE-CIX’ in Athens. The DaaS program is a full-fledged turn-key ecosystem development solution. It contains a package of services meant enable data center operators or other third parties to construct their own interconnection platform that is entirely managed by DE-CIX, such as installation, maintenance, provisioning, marketing, and sales support.
“The hundreds of millions of users in Africa deserve digital services of state-of-the-art quality. This requires the best local infrastructure possible. DE-CIX is delighted to contribute to this to serve the broader need for interconnection, with modern interconnection services designed for businesses such as cloud connectivity and direct access to cloud-based applications.
It’s time for Digital Africa,” said Ivo Ivanov, CEO at DE-CIX International. “We will start with three complementary markets: Nigeria is a strong economic motor that contributes a huge amount of African digital content; the DRC has an excellent geographical position to bridge east and west in the African equatorial corridor; Libya’s unique geographical location, being at the heart of the northern coast of Africa and facing Europe, offers an alternate route for traffic and low-latency connectivity between Africa and Europe.
DE-CIX is proud to support Rack Centre, UNITED, and LITC in the operation of the new interconnection platforms, which are set to become the African crossroads for intra and inter-continental traffic flows, creating both east-west and north-south connectivity corridors for the continent. This will unleash the potential of these established and emerging digital economies by providing better performance and user experience of content and applications, and affordable and high-quality Internet access for enterprises and individuals.”
Connectivity Bridges To and Within Africa
Lagos, Nigeria’s most populous and economically powerful country, is a vital strategic connectivity center for the continent. It provides a strong local connectivity infrastructure to meet increasing domestic demand closer to end users. This is aided by rising Internet and mobile usage, a thriving business ecosystem, and the burgeoning media and entertainment sector known as ‘Nollywood.’
Nigeria is strategically positioned on the West Coast of Africa, ready to offer a low-latency gateway to Europe through Lisbon, with six international underwater cables landing in the metro region and two more expected by 2023.
Kinshasa (DRC) is placed between the continent’s two most heavily populated areas. The new interconnection platform will, over time, create a connectivity corridor across equatorial Africa, with Kinshasa as the hub where networks can exchange data and house content at significantly reduced latency to users, forming an interconnection bridge between neighboring countries from the Atlantic on the west to the Indian Ocean on the east.
Libya is situated on the Mediterranean’s southern coastlines, with the longest coastline of any African country bordering the Mediterranean. Libya has established a significant international connection footprint, with three underwater cables arriving on its beaches and a fourth scheduled to arrive in 2024. These provide the quickest route to Africa by connecting the east and west Libyan coasts with Europe and Asia.
Executive Summary
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DECIX intends to develop interconnection platforms across Africa through strategic partnerships with several African companies in different countries
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By the end of 2022, all three new African platforms should be operational, bringing international capabilities and next-generation interconnection services, including cloud connectivity, to their respective markets
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With this announcement, DE-CIX now has a total of 12 interconnection platforms operating and announced on the DaaS model, joining success stories like ‘UAE-IX powered by DE-IX’ in Dubai and ‘SEE-Cix powered by DGX-Powered by DGx-POWER in Athens.
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The DAAS program is a full-fledged turn-key ecosystem development solution. It contains a package of services meant enable data center operators or other third parties to construct their own interconnection platform that is entirely managed by DECIX.
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Nigeria is strategically positioned on the West Coast of Africa, ready to offer a low-latency gateway to Europe through Lisbon
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Kinshasa (DRC) is placed between the continent’s two most heavily populated areas
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Libya is situated on the Mediterranean’s southern coastlines
