Vox Telecom and Teraco have partnered with Akamai to set up a local node intended to give South Africans faster Internet access.
The companies believe the move could also help to reduce bandwidth costs.
The content delivery platform's Akamai node and infrastructure will be set up by Teraco and connected to NAPAfrica in Johannesburg.
"Akamai and companies like it are the solution to one of the Internet's big challenges - how to get large amounts of data to billions of end users in the most efficient way," says Vox Telecom executive head of network and operations, Shane Chorley.
For Lex van Wyk, CEO of Teraco Data Centre Environments, providing African Internet users with quality international content from a local node in a cost-effective manner, and at world-class download speeds, remains a challenge.
"Video-driven data is flooding the Internet. However, with Akamai gearing up through NAPAfrica and Vox Telecom, the Internet market can now look forward to excellent improvements and benefits," he explains. The days of African Internet users envying the download speeds of their international peers are numbered, Van Wyk adds.
"The addition of international content providers to NAPAfrica means end-users will be able to view video content without endless buffering, access international gaming platforms with a substantially quicker response and download software in a fraction of the time we have become accustomed to."
Chorley notes that every time there's an update to a major operating system like Windows, for example, millions of people around the planet have to download it. "What Akamai does is ensure those millions of people don't all try to get the same content from the same server at the same time - which would cause a nasty traffic jam."
The Akamai installation in SA, means that instead of having to download a big software update from a server in the US or UK, local users can get it from a local node, explains Chorley. "And South African software developers who've been needing to upload their content overseas can now also do it locally."
The bottom line is that downloads will become a lot faster, adds Chorley. "Our international bandwidth is much better than it used to be but it's not infinite, and it's always going to be slower than going local. Putting that key content in Teraco's data centre, and allowing anyone to access it effectively for free via the Vox Telecom network, makes it much quicker to access."
In the long run, Vox Telecom believes the move will speed up the delivery of cloud-based services such as Microsoft Azure into the South African market. "It's great news for anybody wanting to do Azure-based application development."
The move is also good for smaller local ISPs, he adds. "The Akamai node is located within the NAPAfrica open peering point, which gives smaller ISPs more choice. With less international traffic that needs to be handed on to a larger ISP, they get a much stronger negotiating position," he concludes. "Ultimately we expect this will help to cut the cost of bandwidth to ISPs, and to their customers in turn."
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