As of September 2015, service-driven ICT solutions provider, Network Platforms, is officially peering at LINX, a London-based Internet exchange with an impressive 673 member ASNs across 65 countries. This investment provides Network Platforms’ clients with faster and more cost-effective international connectivity routes and improved redundancies and capacity.

“Peering points save on costs as the bandwidth originally used on primary IP transit links is now flowing between the Internet service providers (ISPs) within the peering point and at a reduced cost to them,” explains Brad Love, CEO at Network Platforms.

“Essentially, a peering point allows for all traffic within a specific space to communicate directly rather than having to follow the primary links out and back in. We already have peering points in South Africa and now we can offer an even richer service with a peering point in the United Kingdom.”

Impressive capabilities

Network Platforms currently peer at NAP Africa in Johannesburg and Cape Town as well as with the Johannesburg Internet Exchange (JINX) and has included LINX so as to deepen its offering. The latter provides a peak bandwidth capacity of more than 3Tb and Network Platforms has implemented a protected Layer 2 service from South Africa to LINX for complete redundancy.

Love adds: “The London Internet Exchange (LINX) is similar to NAP with enterprise customers and ISPs using the facilities, which reduces costs and improves routing. Peering with LINX allows us greater scope and capability as well as international Layer 2 capacities. By joining LINX we now lower the price of data transmission to service providers and other networks, including businesses, and our international data performance has increased since implementation.”

The move allows for clients to enjoy lower latencies, lower costs and higher performance, placing Network Platforms among the elite of South Africa as less than ten other local ISPs currently peer with LINX. It is a solution that assures clients of connectivity and capability where it counts.

“Traditionally, if we were sending traffic to an ISP or an organisation in the UK, it would go via our IP Transit that is more costly,” concludes Love. “Through LINX we are assuring the best possible service and functionality for our clients and underscoring our continuing investment into infrastructure and market-leading customer services.”