DE-CIX, an Internet Exchange (IX) operator, has announced the completion of a major infrastructure upgrade for DE-CIX Dallas – the largest data centre and carrier neutral IX in Texas. As part of the upgrade, 400 GE (Gigabit Ethernet) access ports are now generally available to customers, 100 GE access options have been expanded, and the platform has also been made 800 GE-ready, with the aim of helping the region prepare for the upcoming boom in internet peering services and latency-sensitive AI applications.
One of the key changes of the upgrade is enhanced 100 GE access options for customers, now including 100 GE LR technology. While traditional 100 GE LR4 access requires four lasers for transmission, 100 GE LR requires only one laser and uses pulse amplitude modulation (PAM4) to ship data at 100 Gbit/s for a lower hardware cost, increasing efficiency and reducing the cost of optical hardware on the customer side. According to the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and the industry consortium 100G Lambda MSA, this could result in a transceiver cost reduction of more than 40%. Customer hand-off using 100 GE LR4 will continue to be available. The upgrade of DE-CIX Dallas using 400 GE wavelength technology should also increase the scalability of the platform. Additionally, the company has upgraded the US-wide backbone connecting Dallas to locations such as New York, Chicago, and Seattle, and has also connected the city to DE-CIX’s recently commissioned distributed IX in Mexico, with access points in Mexico City and Queretaro.
News of the Dallas upgrade comes just weeks after the announcement that Nokia was selected by DE-CIX to upgrade New York’s largest IX backbone to 400 GE wavelength technology while offering 800 GE support. DE-CIX Internet and Cloud Exchanges in New York, Dallas, Chicago, Richmond, Houston, Phoenix, and the dedicated Cloud Exchange in Seattle, together with the Mexican IX, now form the largest carrier and data centre neutral interconnection ecosystem in the North America.
If Texas was a country, it would be the eighth largest economy in the world, surpassing the likes of Brazil and Italy with a GDP of $2.4 trillion. According to analysts at Cushman and Wakefield, Dallas ranks sixth in global data centre market size, and the city was also recently ranked as the top business hub in America – in part due to its reputation for technological innovation. This upgrade to DE-CIX Dallas increases data capacity on the regional exchange and hopes to prime it for future growth.
“By providing 100 GE LR and 400 GE access, introducing 400 GE wavelength technology in the backbone, and making the hub 800 GE-ready, we have now effectively future-proofed DE-CIX Dallas for the emerging needs of its customers,” comments Thomas King, CTO of DE-CIX. “Demand for large capacities and easy-to-consume interconnection services is set to increase dramatically in the coming years, driven by traffic from high-resolution video content, online gaming, and – of course – artificial intelligence. Customers require simplified solutions to ensure seamless integration of interconnection into their network management and infrastructure strategies to keep pace with this data traffic growth. This is why we not only increased capacity, but also further increased the resilience of the network and added an additional router in the Equinix DA11 facility.”
DE-CIX Dallas is the operator’s second largest IX in North America, with over 140 networks connected. According to Ed d’Agostino, Vice President, DE-CIX North America, “Dallas is a vital transmission hub for our entire North American ecosystem, with a massive coverage potential spanning the South and Southwest regions of the USA and eastern Mexico. The investment in upgrading DE-CIX Dallas demonstrates our continuing commitment to this very important market and the expectation of substantial additional growth.”
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