The evolution of the modern IXP
The Cambridge Dictionary defines the word evolution as “the way in which populations of living things change and develop over time.” Perhaps the most common application of this definition is the foundation of evolutionary biology, which is often ascribed to Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species.”
In the world of networking, the word evolution is often used to describe deliberate changes made in a network to meet certain upcoming performance or scalability requirements. In contrast to the retention of beneficial but random traits and mutations in living things across millions and even billions of years, network evolution must happen intentionally over a much shorter timeframe.
In this blog post, I will describe the evolution of NL-ix’s network and showcase the very intentional and incremental changes the company made to transform it into one of the world’s most secure, sustainable and high-performing internet exchanges.
Leading with innovation
I must confess that when I started to work with NL-ix in 2021, the company was already an innovation leader in the IXP space. As one of the pioneers of modern internet exchanges, NL-ix has always embraced cutting-edge networking technology to serve its customer base with innovative and cost-efficient interconnection services.
At the time, NL-ix’s resilient, low-latency network provided a complete portfolio of interconnection services through more than 100 data centers in Europe. These services gave its customers the connectivity services they needed to meet requirements for deterministic performance and scale.
As enterprises increased their adoption of cloud, latency-sensitive and mission-critical services, NL-ix recognized that it needed to boost network capacity and performance. The company also had a strong desire to grow in a sustainable and environmentally friendly way and recognized that it couldn’t simply scale up its network in the traditional manner.
A new network architecture with the right technology
First, NL-ix redesigned and simplified its network to maximize utilization and minimize stranded resources. The company moved from a philosophy of “all speeds, all services, all sites” to a more innovative, efficient and pragmatic approach to network building. Instead of having many “all service” locations, the redesigned network was made up of three core sites that connected more “right-sized” optimized sites.
Second, NL-ix looked at ways to eliminate parts or layers of the network that it no longer needed. To this end, NL-ix changed the proximity of its routers so they could be directly connected. This eliminated the need for the existing optical transmission network (OTN) and resulted in a significant reduction in power requirements. The elimination of the OTN also removed the need to perform additional electrical-to-optical conversions and optical-to-electrical conversions between the optical and routing layers, which reduced power and space requirements even further.
The third area of focus was to deploy routing technology that would meet growing scale and performance needs while delivering greater power and space efficiency. NL-ix decided to deploy advanced Nokia IP routers powered by Nokia FP5 silicon so that it could offer 800GE access to customers. With 6 Tb/s forwarding capacity and consuming about 0.1 watts per gigabit flow, the FP5 routing silicon offered better scale, efficiency and performance than comparable network processors, without sacrificing the scope or depth of NL-ix’s existing routing capabilities. By upgrading its routers with the FP5-based router technology, NL-ix tripled their capacity in the same resource envelope.
With these changes, NL-ix transformed Amsterdam into Europe’s first “next-generation data hub” while demonstrating why it is one of the most innovative and fastest growing IXPs in the world. However, NL-ix wanted to push the boundaries of innovation even further.
Transforming into a Europe-wide business internet exchange
Deploying Nokia FP5 800GE routers in its Amsterdam data centers allowed NL-ix to support average peak traffic that exceeded 10 Tb/s in 2023. In addition, NL-ix reduced power consumption from 0.8 watts to 0.1 watts per gigabit in the parts of its network where it deployed FP5 technology—a significant step towards sustainability.
Spurred by these results and an ambition to continue to innovate for its customer base, NL-ix deployed Nokia FP5 routers in all of its 100-plus data centers across Europe. This expansion enabled NL-ix to accommodate growing traffic peaks across its entire European footprint, while increasing both power and space efficiency within this expansion.
NL-ix used the FP5 deployment to transform itself into a Europe-wide distributed business internet exchange that offers the lightning speed and ultra-high capacity of 800GE in a green and sustainable way. With this new platform, NL-ix is uniquely positioned to attract new customers in sectors such as banking, insurance and healthcare, which have traditionally relied on exclusive private networks to achieve the performance and scale they needed.
NL-ix’s passion for providing better service to customers was the catalyst for its next evolutionary step: offering security services that protect customers from modern cyber threats.
Protecting customers from DDoS attacks
DDoS attacks are increasing in frequency in sophistication. Until recently, NL-ix ignored DDoS traffic and simply acted like a neutral network intermediary, transporting it from source to destination without interference. However, after hearing from customers about their DDoS security needs and recognizing its unique position as one of the essential “nerve centers” of the internet, NL-ix felt a community responsibility to tackle these malicious attacks head-on.
With FP5 silicon deployed across its network, NL-ix already had a unique and powerful data plane foundation for mitigating these attacks. Adding Nokia Deepfield Defender to its operations center enabled NL-ix to offer a security service that detects DDoS attacks using cutting-edge big data analytics driven by artificial intelligence (AI).
Deepfield Defender detects all types of DDoS quickly and accurately, and drives agile, granular, network-based mitigation on the existing FP5-based routers, with minimal or no impact on services or customer traffic.
By partnering with Nokia and deploying the Deepfield Defender anti-DDoS solution, NL-ix can defend its customers from the latest generation of threats and count on having plenty of headroom to scale as needed.
This new service allows NL-ix to act as a “one-stop shop” for Europe-wide connectivity and security. There’s no need for its customers to work with multiple parties or make complex arrangements to be protected by a third party.
The journey is the point
I am proud to have been a part of the journey as NL-ix has intentionally and intelligently transformed its network over the past few years. This desire to do things better and use the latest technological innovations to keep improving services is baked into the culture at NL-ix. At Nokia, these are the customers who drive our passion.
The interesting fact that I have come to realize about NL-ix is that when it comes to innovation, there is no end state or destination. Just like Darwin’s theory of evolution, the journey of evolution will not end, and perhaps that is the point.
