Nelson Mandela Bay in the Eastern Cape has welcomed the latest addition to INX-ZA’s community-run Internet Exchange Point (IXP) services. The new Nelson Mandela Bay Internet Exchange Point (NMBINX) aims to improve the Eastern Cape Internet ecosystem and provide businesses faster and more efficient traffic routing, reduced latency, and improved network resilience.
NMBINX offers network operators in the Eastern Cape region the opportunity to connect to other local networks, content providers and cloud service providers through a single peering point. The first node of NMBINX will be operational in Gqeberha, at the Dimension Data facility in Newton Park, from the first week of June 2023.
INX-ZA operates SA’s only community-run Internet exchanges in Cape Town (CINX), Durban (DINX), Johannesburg (JINX) and now Nelson Mandela Bay (NMBINX), since JINX’s launch in 1996 as a project of the country’s Internet Service Providers’ Association (ISPA).
To promote interconnection in the region, INX-ZA has waived port fees, and the co-location facility has waived monthly recurring cross-connect fees. This will help to lower costs and improve latencies, keeping Internet traffic local and reducing reliance on international transit.
This development is particularly significant for the Eastern Cape region, which has a history of outages due to multiple simultaneous backhaul failures. With NMBINX, ISPs based in Nelson Mandela Bay can serve content locally, leading to cost savings for ISPs and consumers.
INX-ZA’s overarching objective is to benefit Internet consumers and promote the growth of the South African Internet ecosystem. As an independent operating division of ISPA, its members regularly contribute towards the country’s INXes. The Johannesburg exchange point has provided continuous, uninterrupted services to users since June 1996, highlighting the sustained investment in the country’s Internet exchanges.
