Executive Report Using the CyrusOne IX for Active-Active, Active-Passive and Active-DR Interconnection
A better use of time and money is to use large Web-scale carrier-neutral data centers containing the resiliency required for power, cooling, seismic stability, and most importantly, connectivity. Establishing the Right DR Strategy Single consolidated data center With all of the eggs in one basket, harden the basket. Two data centers Active passive Active active Most enterprises today are required to operate at least a simple disaster recovery (DR) data center strategy to maintain business continuity due to regulations and other factors including uptime resiliency. Compliance, regulations and due diligence often necessitate the active synching of IT environments to each other (active-active) or asymmetrical synching to each other (active-passive). These enhanced DR strategies require highly connected data centers within specific latency parameters, and also require careful site selection. Factors for site selection include power-grid resiliency (there are three grids in North America: East, West and Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)), seismic mitigation and network availability. These three factors can create a daunting task for an enterprise, especially when needing to hire dedicated staff to select, build and operate these facilities. Using in-place optical waves, multiprotocol label switching (MPLS) and Internet Protocol (IP) transit greatly reduces costs and removes the need for expensive telecom hardware and the staff to operate that hardware. How a National IX Works The CyrusOne National Internet Exchange (IX) meets many requirements for connectivity by delivering carrier-class infrastructure to data centers. This neutral platform has dedicated high-speed multiple carrier waves and MPLS between sites already in place. All of this can be delivered from simple cross-connects or a dynamic IX Ethernet switch port. Three or more data centers Active active passive Active active active A simple analogy is that an IX is like a large international airport. Many airlines arrive at an airport, but they may not own all the air routes departing from that airport. Therefore, they may rely on other airlines to carry their passengers or cargo to their final destination. Passing through a large airport provides a passenger with multiple connections and facilitates a competitive environment between airlines to try to capture that business. An IX is, simply stated, the airport of the Internet. It is located in strategic geographic locations where multitudes of fiber-optic cables are located, typically with large, dense populations of users nearby. 2 CyrusOne Enterprise Data Centers 855-564-3198 CyrusOne.com
Most IX are Not Cost-Effective Solutions for Enterprises Currently, IX are located in carrier hotels where space is very limited and pricing has become untenable for anyone other than the largest Internet service providers (ISPs) and content companies. If an enterprise locates its information technology (IT)infrastructure within one of these IXs today, pricing can be very high for the required data center space and power. This high pricing creates a dilemma. Enterprise companies want the value and resiliency of connecting to the IX, however, enterprises typically have large core production environments, so the cost of locating that much hardware in a carrier hotel is not economically feasible. Another Connectivity Option is Now Available There is, however, a dramatic movement being driven by large Internet companies that is changing this dynamic. These companies operate gigantic compute farms with millions of servers located in very large wholesale or company-owned data centers. As content has moved away from carrier hotels, it has pulled the core of the Internet traffic away with it. As multiples of these content companies cohabitate within geographic areas (mostly due to lower power costs), they are creating new edge interconnection points. Adding IX at these edge sites now creates a viable connection point for a large-scale enterprise as well. Additionally, there is movement into metro and nationally connected IXs in North America. New York Metro (coming soon) CHICAGO NORTHERN VIRGINIA CINCINNATI METRO PHOENIX DALLAS AUSTIN HOUSTON SAN ANTONIO 3 CyrusOne Enterprise Data Centers 855-564-3198 CyrusOne.com
This movement is enabling the edge IX to be directly interconnected to the carrier hotel IX, thereby creating an ecosystem of peers, partners and providers to the edgeconnected companies. This immediate ecosystem of connectivity drives resiliency up for the Internet and costs down for the edge-collocated enterprise. If an enterprise uses the IX to exchange data with cloud providers, the connection into that cloud provider would be direct without any intermediary ISP or carrier. This direct connection gives an enterprise control over their traffic and lowers the cost basis for access to the compute power they need with the cloud provider. It also enables an enterprise to connect to multiple cloud providers across a single port on the exchange using Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) or 801.11q VLAN tagging. A simple interface with multiple partners is as dynamic as it gets for an enterprise. Purchasing Internet transit, MPLS or dedicated optical waves is a process fraught with high costs for an enterprise. The high cost is due to carriers serving enterprise data centers in remote locations, office buildings or other non-core locations. To account for this added edge infrastructure, the carriers must charge more to recover their investments. To solve this issue, an enterprise should locate its infrastructure within a large carrierneutral data center, providing access to the infrastructure of the carriers that does not require the cost recovery of an edge location. The CyrusOne National IX Delivers Robust, National Connectivity Enterprises locating large-scale production environments within Web-scale carrierneutral data centers can benefit from connectivity cost savings and enjoy a more reliable data center operated by teams focused on uptime. The cost savings advantage of accessing the CyrusOne National IX within the site and multisite environments is a simple formula for dynamic interconnection of the modern enterprise. 4 CyrusOne Enterprise Data Centers 855-564-3198 CyrusOne.com
About CyrusOne CyrusOne specializes in providing highly reliable, flexible and scalable enterprise data center colocation that meets the specific needs of customers across its broad portfolio of carrier-neutral data center facilities in the United States, Europe and Asia. CyrusOne employs its Massively Modular engineering and design approach to optimize design and construction materials sourcing and enable just-in-time data hall inventory to meet customer demand. The company engineers its facilities with redundant power technology, including an available 2N architecture. CyrusOne customers can mix and match data centers to create their own production and/or disaster recovery platforms by combining facilities via the low-cost, robust interconnectivity provided by the CyrusOne National Internet Exchange (IX). About the Author Josh Snowhorn Vice President and General Manager, Interconnection Josh currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Open Internet Exchange, and brings 15 years of data center and interconnection experience to his role, which is largely dedicated to expanding the CyrusOne National Internet Exchange (IX) across the company s worldwide data center locations. Josh and his team have designed and implemented the CyrusOne National IX strategy to significantly increase the number of telecom and cloud providers available to customers, enabling Internet peering and leveraging industry-changing interconnection ecosystems. This proprietary and innovative technology was honored by DataCenter Dynamics as the 2014 Outsourced Innovation of the Year. Before joining CyrusOne in 2012, Josh spent the previous 12 years as Vice President of Business Development at Terremark, a global Data Center and Cloud services provider acquired by Verizon in 2011. There he developed new business in emerging markets and drove all business related to peering and interconnection throughout the company s portfolio. Beyond his previous role at Terremark, and his current role at CyrusOne, he is currently affiliated with industry-leading organizations such as the Open Internet Exchange Association, the North American Network Operators Group (NANOG), Réseaux IP Européens (RIPE), the European Internet Exchange Association (Euro-IX), and the Global Peering Forum (GPF), a joint venture that he co-founded with Equinix, AMS-IX, DE-CIX, and LINX. Josh serves on the Global Peering Forum Board of Directors, the Open-IX Board of Directors, the McLaren Car Club Board of Directors and the Austin Waldorf School Board of Trustees. He resides in Austin, Texas with his wife, two daughters, two dogs and a flock of chickens. ER-011-2016 2016 CyrusOne Inc. CyrusOne Enterprise Data Centers 855-564-3198 CyrusOne.com