Today’s society is driven by the Internet. Everything from running enterprises and getting healthcare to making reservations and communicating with loved ones requires a digital connection that is quick, reliable, and secure.
To accommodate this growing societal reliance, the Internet is evolving, and one of the most critical evolutions comes in the form of Internet Exchange Points (IXPs). An IXP is a physical building through which local Internet service providers (ISPs), cloud services, content delivery networks, and transit providers of all types can meet and exchange Internet traffic between their networks.
“Not to be confused with the IXP facility, an Internet Exchange (IX) is an Ethernet switch that enables IP network operators to exchange Internet traffic with one another over the switch fabric. IP network operators connect to this IX port, which in turn allows them to connect to other networks and exchange traffic—in a process known as “peering”—according to their respective policies.”
Cities with neutral interconnection facilities benefit from low-latency connections, access to inexpensive, wholesale IP transit, and proximity to cloud services and content delivery networks. In simpler terms: any area with an IXP can keep pace with the quickly evolving Internet.
While major metro areas often have more than one IXP, small cities and rural areas risk getting left behind without one, particularly as latency reduction increases in importance relative to increases in bandwidth.
Despite the fact that 57 metro markets across the U.S. have IXP facilities, 14 states and 3 territories have no such facility at all. Even states that have strong interconnection ecosystems in certain regions—such as Dallas, TX, or Miami, FL—may still have regions within them where IXP development is needed. The panhandle regions of Texas and Florida are two such examples.
