The DE-CIX Virtual Interconnection Summit – North American edition – held on December 16, 2020 unveiled news that the company announced two new Internet Exchange (IX) sites in North America, doubling the company’s presence overnight.  

The ‘breaking news’ included new locations for DE-CIX in Chicago and Richmond Virginia. 

DE-CIX Chicago is available for service today in 12 facilities throughout the metro market including key carrier hotels 427 S. LaSalle and 350 E. Cermak. The fully redundant and distributed carrier and data center neutral IX and multi-service interconnection fabric of DE-CIX Chicago, launches with more than 10 networks connected day one. DE-CIX Chicago anchors the Midwest region for DE-CIX North America. Connectivity in and throughout Chicago reaches the east, west and southern coasts of the United States with direct connectivity to Canada, firmly positioning the market as a core interconnection point in North America. Until today, Chicago is the only core communications hub without a second major Internet Exchange. Similar to the Dallas market prior to DE-CIX Dallas’ launch in 2016, DE-CIX intends to create a second major IX in the Chicago market

DE-CIX’s Richmond expansion is possible through the asset acquisition of the RVA-IX | Richmond Virginia Internet Exchange. RVA-IX is a community-lead IX non-profit initiative that was launched in 2016 by: SummitIG, Richweb, VA Skywire, Pixel Factory, and the Bank of Virginia. The RVA-IX has access points throughout the Richmond market with Pixel Factory Data Center, EdgeConneX, and QTS Datacenters. Through the asset acquisition of the RVA-IX, DE-CIX will take operational ownership, and will expand upon its interconnection capabilities benefiting the local and regional market. Integration into the DE-CIX interconnection ecosystem means that connected networks in Richmond will have access to more services, can reach 

“By announcing these two very important Internet Exchange locations for DE-CIX Chicago, and Richmond, we will have four key markets fortified for interconnectivity solutions,” comments Ivo Ivanov, CEO of DE-CIX International. “The success of DE-CIX New York and DE-CIX Dallas, solidifies our position in the market as the leading neutral interconnection platform provider for Internet peering and cloud connectivity.”

DE-CIX’s North American footprint now spanning the Chicago, Dallas, New York and Richmond markets are or will be interconnected with each other via a private network, creating a fully redundant, optimized low-latency route between each market (Note: Richmond will be connected when the DE-CIX asset acquisition closes and it’s ready for service).

The DE-CIX Virtual Interconnection Summit – North American edition, hosted in the company’s virtual arena, was broadcasted globally and featured speakers from Uber, represented by Sarah Keller, Director, Technology Sourcing and Supply Chain; Hilton Hotels represented by Michael Leidinger, Senior Vice President and CIO; and Subspace represented by Jason Black, Director of Network Development; as well as industry infrastructure experts Sean Bailie, EVP Global Connectivity Ecosystems and Services for QTS Datacenters; Scott Willis, CEO of DartPoints; Hunter Newby, Partner of 1025Connect; Jezzibell Gilmore, Co-Founder and Chief Commercial Officer of PacketFabric, Andy Bax, COO of Seaborn; Christian Koch, Product Management at Digital Realty; Vinay Kanitkar, CTO of Akamai; and Scott Brown of the RVA-IX.

For more information about DE-CIX’s formidable North American presence, you can read the press release in its entirety here: DE-CIX Doubles its Internet Exchange Footprint in NA