NAPAfrica, known as Africa’s foremost Internet Exchange Point (IXP) and ranking seventh in the world, has announced it has now driven 4.5 Terabits per second (Tbps) of internet traffic, marking a significant achievement in digital connectivity across the continent.
The exchange, hosted in Teraco’s data centres in Cape Town, Durban, and Johannesburg, has seen its community of peers grow by over 40 organizations within the last year, now boasting 652 unique organizations. This expansion includes new members like Mimecast, Fortinet, and Tencent, alongside major players such as Akamai, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance (TikTok), CDN77, Cloudflare, Meta, Google, Microsoft, and Netflix.
Andrew Owens, Interconnection and Peering Lead at Teraco, emphasized the importance of this growth. “The surge in traffic reflects Africa’s dynamic internet community’s embrace of peering, alongside the increasing demand for cloud services, video, and gaming content,” he stated. This development underlines the essential role of peering in enhancing digital transformation in Africa by reducing costs and improving delivery speeds for content providers and businesses.
Technological Advancements
Contents
In response to the growing traffic, NAPAfrica has introduced 400Gbps interconnect options, a first for an African IXP, catering to the needs of large-scale content and cloud service providers. Additionally, the implementation of the Kentik Network Observability platform aims to provide enhanced network performance insights, aiding in better management and optimization of internet traffic.
Local Content Delivery Boost
To improve local content delivery, NAPAfrica has started hosting regional cache servers, including Netflix Open Connect servers in Cape Town and Durban, which significantly decreases content load times for local users, enhancing the overall user experience.
Supporting Digital Expansion
Michele McCann, Head of Platforms at Teraco, noted, “With hundreds of carriers and networks, NAPAfrica fosters an environment that supports affordable and efficient content distribution, crucial for meeting the escalating demand for digital services in Africa.”
This infrastructure milestone supports Africa’s growing digital needs, facilitating better internet communication, cloud strategies, and connectivity as the continent sees increased demand for digital services.
About NAPAfrica and Teraco
NAPAfrica serves as a pivotal interconnection platform in Africa, hosting a diverse ecosystem of global carriers, cloud providers, and digital services, with a mission to enhance internet accessibility across the continent. Teraco, its host, is a leading carrier-neutral colocation provider, playing a crucial role in Africa’s internet backbone.
