Creating exchanges [Was: Re: MAE-East - 30%]

Sun Oct 13 14:22:21 UTC 1996

Dave Curado wrote:
> but note that HK has a reasonable sized nap already.  The HKIX.
> My understanding is that they are about to upgrade the exchange
> to an ATM switch. (whatever)

Just a minor note regarding HKIX:

As the person-in-charge of HKIX, I would say upgrading to ATM is not of
urgent need for the current traffic volume (5-min average up to
11Mbps).  In fact, with the expensive tariff of T3 local circuit (starts
at US$7,700/month for a full circuit) and unavailability of clearline
OC3 service, upgrading HKIX (currently a Catalyst 5000) with an ATM
switch is almost out of the question especially after the recent
roll-out of city-wide ATM service by Hongkong Telecom (starts at
US$4,200/month for two ends with OC3 physical circuits).

> I'd love to see someone get an oc3/12/48 pipe from HK to the west
> coast, and resell to the 60+ HK ISPs at reasonable prices.

Me too.  :)  But unfortunately, it is still not justified to set up a
OC3 pipe for Hong Kong.  But maybe a DS3 pipe is justified.  Anyone
looking at this business opportunity?  :)

> For the time being, it seems that the most affordable solution would
> be for each country to build it's own exchange, and have everything
> link back via the US.  (although its silly to have traffic from HK
> to Bangkok routing via San Jose...)

It seems that this applies more to medium-sized ISPs.  We now see large
ISPs with deep pockets setting up intra-Asia/Pacific connections or
backbones.  Examples are Global One, Asia Internet Holdings (ABONE),
UUNET, AT&T, IBM, CWIX, STIX, and mesh connections of ISPs run by
telephone companies in Asia/Pacific.  It seems that they have totally
different business models.  Fortunately (to HK), most of them have
presence in Hong Kong so they can choose to interconnect at HKIX.  :)

Cheers,

-- 

Che-Hoo Cheng                       | Email: chcheng at cuhk.edu.hk
Data Comms and Networking Section   | URL:   http://www.cuhk.edu.hk/
Information Technology Service Unit | Tel:   +852 2609-8848
The Chinese University of Hong Kong | Fax:   +852 2603-5001