LEGENDS CONNECT TAPS WORKONLINE FOR SUPERIOR SERVICE
South African niche ISP, Legends Connect, recently signed up Workonline Communications as its wholesale network service provider of choice, and is in the process of migrating all of its traffic to Workonline.
Legends Connect’s specialty is providing fixed wireless broadband or fibre connectivity to homes and businesses in the East Rand that are located outside of regular fixed network coverage. The ISP needed additional capacity and was looking for a service provider with strong international and local routes, plus excellent service and support.
“There are two sides to the Internet connectivity coin, and so we were looking for someone who, when things went wrong, wouldn’t just shrug their shoulders and blame it on the network on the remote side. Instead, they’d roll up their sleeves and work to resolve the issues between networks. We found this with Workonline,” said Brent Kruger, senior network engineer at Legends Connect.
WomenTechConnect LAUNCHES WITH LINX AT AfPIF@iWeek2018
Workonline Communications, one of Africa’s leading IP transit providers, is launching WomenTechConnect at a networking lunch at AfPIF this year, alongside co-sponsors, LINX the London Internet Exchange.
Workonline Communications initiated the programme - WomenTechConnect - to promote positive change for women in the ICT workplace.
The event will be held at AfPIF, on 21 August in Cape Town, South Africa, as part of the official agenda on day one. The lunch will bring together Africa’s women working in peering environments, network engineering, and with content distribution networks, among other sectors.
There will be a panel of experienced women who will share their experiences led by Marijana Novakovic, Staff Network Engineer at LinkedIn in San Francisco. The panel will include Workonline’s Senior Network Engineer, Michelle Opiyo from Nairobi, Kenya; and Florence Lavoff, Manager: Interconnections Relations, Peering and Content Distribution Network at Google in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
WomenTechConnect aims to build a community of collaboration and support for women in tech focused on three key areas:
- Creating channels and support for dealing with inappropriate behaviour
- Attracting and retaining more women in technology
- Creating a networking and support group
There are incredible women involved in all aspects of the Internet. As a community, its possible to inspire each other and to lead and grow the Internet community to achieve even greater things.
The forum aims to create a platform for women to share experiences, achievements and best practices with one another. Invited speakers have will share their insights on how they have been able to overcome workplace challenges and find allies and inspiration to achieve their best work.
Register here for the event. Please note that seats are limited and are offered on a first come first served basis.
Workonline Communications
Workonline provides IP transit services, wholesale Ethernet and VPN services, remote peering services to the major IXs (in Africa, Europe and Asia), as well as colocation services in Africa. It is a staunch supporter of women-owned businesses across the African continent and has focused initiatives on building and developing communities, as part of its mantra: connecting Africa to the world and the world to Africa.
London Internet Exchange (LINX)
The London Internet Exchange (LINX) is a mutually owned membership association for operators of Internet Protocol networks. They provide a neutral interconnection facility and peering platform, known as an Internet Exchange Point (IXP), and represent the interests of their members on matters of public policy. LINX is one of the largest Internet exchanges in the world, connecting over 820 member ASNs from over 80 countries around the globe. LINX are located in 12 PoPs across the capital along with regional exchanges in Wales, Manchester and Scotland. LINX also operates an Internet exchange in the Ashburn metro area in the US just outside Washington DC, LINX NoVA. For more information, please visit www.linx.net or email marketing@linx.net
SUPERCHARGING EDUCATION IN SOUTH AFRICA WITH AFRICA TIKKUN
It’s a bit of an obvious thing to say that we believe the Internet changes lives, especially through education. One of the ways we put this into practice is through our ongoing partnership with NGO, Africa Tikkun. Since 2016 we have supplied free high-speed Internet to its child and youth development centres in five communities around South Africa.
Afrika Tikkun’s mission is to invest in education, health and social services for children, youth and their families through community centres of excellence and strategic partnerships. Improved Internet connectivity has helped the organisation achieve a 97% high school final year pass rate, with 67 distinctions in 2017. In total, 8,586 young people, from two-years-old and older, benefitted, and 2,884 became employable, with 928 placed in a job or self-employed. Of those completing high school, 65% were enrolled in tertiary education or other further learning opportunities.
Meet 19-year-old Athabile Fatyela from Mfuleni, Cape Town. She plans to become a chartered accountant and is currently at the University of the Western Cape starting her BCom degree. With Afrika Tikkun’s help she was able to achieve high grades both in grade 11 and 12, and she says: “A big part is the access to Internet and computers, I wasn’t so great at operating a computer but I am now more confident and was able to get previous question papers online to prepare for my final exams.”
We are proud to be part of such amazing results.
NODE AFRICA SELECTS WORKONLINE AS UPSTREAM PROVIDER
East African provider of bespoke cloud infrastructure solutions, Node Africa, has chosen privately owned global Network Service Provider, Workonline Communications as their IP transit provider.
Workonline is one of the top three ASN’s in Africa and one of Africa’s largest carriers. Phares Kariuki, CEO at Node Africa, explains that the partnership is a natural fit, based on similar business philosophies. “Node Africa, like Workonline, is committed to creating a long-term partnership with our clients, leveraging on each other’s strengths and looking at the long term vision rather than merely selling them products or services. I believe our philosophies are similar in this way, and that this will lead to a long and successful partnership in East Africa, and Africa.”
He explains that while the organisation has taken the role of providing customised cloud solutions to cater to their client’s needs, Node Africa views itself as a hybrid data management company that creates and integrates unique solutions, instead of a cloud and infrastructure company.
Edward Lawrence, Director of Business Development at Workonline explains, “As a company, we are dedicated to connecting Africa to the world and the world to Africa. This partnership is one more step in the right direction in that regard, and is in line with our philosophy of providing the best for Africa. I believe our expertise and forward thinking ability in terms of leadership in software, tools and network infrastructure make us the right provider for Node Africa.”
“We are dedicated to driving the development of the tech community and sector in East Africa, and are excited about working with one of the region’s leading businesses,” Lawrence concludes.
WORKONLINE COMMUNICATIONS CONTINUES EXPANSION INTO EAST AFRICA
Workonline Communications extends its IP transit service offering into Kenya.
Wholesale network service provider Workonline Communications has expanded its East African presence by making its IP transit services available in Nairobi, Kenya. Workonline Communications’ head of business development, Benjamin Deveaux, states that the further expansion of the company’s service offering in East Africa was fuelled by the region’s growing demand for better connectivity services and the company’s commitment to the development of Africa’s ICT sector.
“As more users come online in East Africa at an incredible pace, the region continues to be strategically important for the development of the African Internet landscape,” explains Deveaux. “To realise this potential, ISPs (Internet Service Providers) need more upstreams who are focused on wholesale and who offer faster, more stable connectivity to the rest of the world. Conversely, these developments mean that Workonline’s customers outside the region can reach Kenya and East Africa over a stable and reliable network, with lower latency. Our focus on the development of the local market in Kenya through our wholesale IP transit services will assist in the growth of local networks who will be able to connect, through us, to the rest of the world, and remain competitive in this fast changing market.”
Deveaux outlines that Kenya’s regional leadership in the telecommunications space, the regulatory environment, as well as its existing and future infrastructure, positions the country extremely attractively to investors and international content providers, and is highly promising in terms of ICT development and growth.
“Our aim is to connect Africa to the world and the world to Africa, and our further expansion into the region is another step toward achieving this goal,” he explains. “For many networks who have already branched out into Southern Africa, deploying in East and West Africa are the next obvious steps in their strategies. We are excited about the prospects for growth in the region and look forward to working alongside the local community.”
Workonline (AS 37271) is the fastest growing IP transit network in Africa and one of the largest in Africa. The company is focused on providing highly scalable, high quality, and flexible service options to meet the needs of carriers, Internet service providers, content providers, and mobile operators.
“Our international links connect East and Southern Africa to the rest of the world through all available routes. The quality of our network is amplified by our partnerships with the world’s leading global tier 1 IP transit providers such as Level 3, NTT, TI Sparkle, TeliaSonera, GTT, Tata and Cogent.” says Deveaux. “This allows us to provide the lowest latency world-class IP transit services possible to our clients across sub-Saharan Africa.”
In addition to offering its services, Workonline Communications is committed to developing the operating environment further, by doing its part in developing key skills, providing training to the local community where necessary, promoting IPv6 development, and assisting to lower the operating costs of ISPs in the region.
“At Workonline we see access to the Internet as a basic human right, and realise the potential it has to change lives and economies in which we operate for the better. We are excited about this next step in our expansion strategy and look forward to connecting more networks to the Internet,” concludes Deveaux.
LEADING SENIOR NETWORK ENGINEER JOINS WORKONLINE COMMUNICATIONS
Michelle Opiyo has joined Workonline Communications as Senior Network Engineer based in Nairobi, Kenya, adding her high-ranking skill and experience to the company’s existing team of leading engineers.
Michelle has over seven years of experience in the ICT Service Provider industry. She attained her Bsc In Electronic and Computer Engineering from the Jomo Kenyatta University of Science and Technology. Prior to joining Workonline, she served in various capacities at the national research and education network of Kenya (KENET) where she operated the core network and delivered tailor made solutions to top Universities and Research Institutions.
Michelle's core skills are in network design, implementation and operation, capacity building and community development. She is passionate about developing the African Internet connectivity landscape and opening it up to the world, as well as developing the abilities of engineers on the continent. To this end, Michelle volunteers as a trainer for various regional technical forums and network operator groups (NOGs) where she trains and mentors engineers.
Workonline (AS 37271) is widely acclaimed as one of the largest IP transit networks in sub-Saharan Africa, and the company’s engineers are often recognised for their achievements in the global community.
“We are proud to have Michelle join our respected team, and we look forward working together as well as learning from one another over the years to come,” says Edward Lawrence, Director of Business Development at Workonline Communications.
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About Workonline Communications
Workonline (AS 37271) is widely acclaimed as one of the largest, and most extensively globally peered, IP transit providers in Africa. Being pivotal in the development of the African internet ecosystem, Workonline customers include many of Africa’s and the world’s largest ISPs and CDNs.
Workonline engineers are often recognised for their achievements in the international community, building the best quality, globally respected and well-engineered network on the African continent. www.workonline.co.za | @wolcomm
NEW PoPS IN AMSTERDAM AND FRANKFURT
Workonline Communications Adds Points of Presence in Interxion’s Amsterdam and Frankfurt Data Centre Campuses
Expanded European presence enables Workonline Communications to deliver high-quality IP transit and connectivity services to African Market
AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS – November 9, 2017 – INTERXION HOLDING NV (NYSE: INXN), a leading provider of carrier and cloud-neutral colocation data centre services in Europe, today announced that Workonline Communications, the leading pan-African IP transit network, has deployed Points of Presence (PoPs) in its Amsterdam and Frankfurt data centre campuses.
With PoPs located at these key Iocations, Workonline Communications interconnects with other global networks and Europe’s largest internet exchanges, cost effectively enhancing Workonline’s ability to deliver content and traffic to and from Africa.
“Amsterdam and Frankfurt are two of Interxion’s most connected and carrier-dense campuses in Europe,” said Mike Hollands, Director of Market Development and Strategy at Interxion. “By expanding its presence to these locations, Workonline Communications strengthens its European edge to deliver highly-performant, reliable and secure services to meet the demands of the African market.”
With IP traffic in Africa set to grow six-fold, and Sub-Saharan Africa expected to have 500 million mobile users all by 2020, the market is experiencing unprecedented demands for content distribution between Europe and Africa. By deploying PoPs at Interxion’s campuses, Workonline Communications brings the African market closer to content networks with a European presence, for improved end-user experience. At the same time, Interxion customers can now access secure and reliable connectivity options provided by Workonline Communications for new and existing opportunities in Africa.
“At Workonline, we are committed to connecting Africa to the world and the world to Africa,” said Edward Lawrence, Director of Business Development at Workonline Communications. “With its strategically located, secure, reliable and highly connected facilities, we are certain that Interxion is the right partner to help us to do just that. We look forward to continuing to expand our relationship with Interxion in the near future.”
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About Interxion
Interxion (NYSE: INXN) is a leading provider of carrier and cloud-neutral colocation data centre services in Europe, serving a wide range of customers through 48 data centres in 11 European countries. Interxion’s uniformly designed, energy efficient data centres offer customers extensive security and uptime for their mission-critical applications.
With over 600 connectivity providers, 21 European Internet exchanges, and most leading cloud and digital media platforms across its footprint, Interxion has created connectivity, cloud, content and finance hubs that foster growing customer communities of interest. For more information, please visit www.interxion.com.
About Workonline Communications
Workonline (AS 37271) is widely acclaimed as one of the largest, and most extensively globally peered, IP transit providers in Africa. Being pivotal in the development of the African internet ecosystem, Workonline customers include many of Africa’s and the world’s largest ISPs and CDNs.
Workonline engineers are often recognised for their achievements in the international community, building the best quality, globally respected and well-engineered network on the African continent. www.workonline.co.za | @wolcomm
Press Contact
Samantha Bell
March Communications
interxion@marchcomms.com
+1 (617) 960-8896
TOGETHER FOR A BETTER AFRICAN INTERNET
As part of its commitment to assisting African networks to further develop their global footprint, Workonline, leading provider of wholesale IP transit and transport services based in sub-Saharan Africa, and DE-CIX as a worldwide leading Internet Exchange Operator, are continuing their successful cooperation. Both companies were present at this year’s African Peering and Interconnection Forum (AfPIF) in Abidjan, Côte D'Ivoire, from 22 to 24 of August.
In this partnership, Workonline takes the role of a reseller for DE-CIX premium peering services. Peering at an Internet Exchange (IX) opens up opportunities for the local African networks to lower their latency to other networks in the world. This also brings African eyeballs closer to content networks with a European presence, which improves the internet browsing experience for the end-user.
DE-CIX operates 11 carrier and data center neutral IXs from the Middle East and Europe to the United States of America. DE-CIX in Frankfurt (Germany) is the world’s leading IX with more than 5.6 Terabits per second peak traffic. More than 1000 customers from 60+ nations use DE-CIX’s platforms to lower costs, reduce latency, and increase IP performance and resilience.
“With this partnership we are clearly building digital bridges between the African and European continent for the sake of a better Internet for African end-users. We are committed to further grow our relationship with Workonline to let the importance of peering grow globally”, says Melanie Kempf – Director Global Partner Relations at DE-CIX.
The company’s relationship with the German-based Internet Exchange (IX), DE-CIX, will assist Workonline and its clients to extend their reach. The exchange is now one of several global IXs to which Workonline offers remote peering services.
“Workonline remains committed to connecting Africa to the world and the world to Africa. Partnerships such as this assist our clients in reaching their goals and extending their reach. Improving the quality of the internet in Africa boosts socio-economic development and accelerate growth in the region. We believe fast and easy to access Internet is the key to a well-functioning modern society”, states Edward Lawrence, Director of Business Development at Workonline.
(First published here: https://www.internetsociety.org/afpif/2017/en/news/together-better-african-internet-workonline-and-de-cix-intensify-their-partnership)
WORKONLINE SETS UP NNI TO OCTOTEL
Innovative pan-African service provider Workonline Communications is once again increasing collaboration in the South African market, and underpinning the provision of reliable connectivity to more fibre networks.
Workonline has set up a network-to-network interface (NNI) with Open Access Fibre to the home (FTTH) provider, Octotel, to lower the barrier to entry for Workonline clients to access the Octotel network from any of the Workonline points of presence (including Johannesburg, Durban, Nairobi, London, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, etc).
Workonline’s co-founder and Director of Business Development, Edward Lawrence explains, “This is another important step in our bid to foster collaboration in the local market through reliable partnerships, and thereby assisting our clients in expanding their networks.”
Octotel’s network covers several areas in Cape Town’s city bowl and along the Atlantic seaboard, including Sea Point, Bantry Bay, Mouille Point, Three Anchor Bay, Green Point, Vredehoek, Oranjezicht, Gardens, High Cape, Bloubergstrand and University Estate.
As Cape Town's largest Open Access FTTH provider, Octotel welcomes partnerships that make it easier for service providers to join our network and enable more value and choice. We are excited about the possibilities this partnership presents," says Octotel CTO, Joe Botha.
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MORE CONTENT FOR AFRICA
Privately owned global Network Service Provider Workonline Communications and online broadcasting platform provider Tysflo, have announced a strategic partnership that will see Tysflo expanding in the African market, offering African businesses a new media platform.
Workonline Communications and data centre service provider Teraco are working to bring quality content to African shores over Tysflo’s platforms. Tysflo offers full-service OTT (Over-The-Top TV) & IP TV (Internet Protocol TV) platforms with strategic consultancy & support from dedicated broadcast professionals and programmers to facilitate solutions and develop new media platforms for businesses.
“Workonline Communications and Teraco are the foundation on which South Africa is driving the development of its own online ecosystems,” says Jyri Hamalainen, Chief Executive Officer at Tysflo. “Broadcast video for OTT & IP TV delivery can be a complex, misunderstood landscape in Africa. The Tysflo.tv USP requires nothing short of a reliable, very well peered network both across Africa and around the world, and a world-class hosting environment for our custom built, scalable video cloud processing technology. We are confident that Workonline and Teraco are the right partners for this project.
Edward Lawrence, Director of Business Development at Workonline Communications, explains that this partnership is aligned with Workonline’s commitment to providing the best for Africa. “Facilitating for the creation of quality local content is something we are excited about. It is in line with our commitment to the development of the African Internet landscape and the services available here. The reliability of our network combined with the knowledge of our team makes us the right provider to distribute the Tysflo content across Africa and globally.”
ENDS
Notes to Editors:
Press Contact
Gia Costella, Lion’s Wing Brand Communications
gia@lionswing.co.za
About Workonline
Founded in South Africa in 2006, Workonline Communications is a privately owned global Network Service Provider.
Workonline (AS 37271) is widely acclaimed as one of the largest IP transit networks in southern Africa, and our engineers are often recognised for their achievements in the global community. The Workonline network, along with the reach of our international partners, enables us to offer high quality IP transit services as well as wholesale connectivity services across Africa and in most locations in the world.
Our customers include some of the world’s largest telecommunication companies. We pride ourselves on the stability and resilience of our global network, which we operate according to the highest standards, in line with global best practices. Whilst we are large enough to ensure consistent reliability and innovation, we remain flexible enough to adapt to the specific requirements of our wholesale customers.
As a trusted advisor to our clients, innovation and agility remain at the core of our business. Our research and development is constantly in motion providing our clients with innovative and cost-effective solutions on a global scale while maintaining the highest levels of design, build and deployment. Designing innovative commercial and technical solutions has led to our exponential growth over the last decade, and ensures that we remain a leader in the provision of reliable tailor made communication services.
For more information, please visit http://www.workonline.co.za/ or email communications@workonline.africa
Twitter: twitter.com/wolcomm
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/workonline-communications
About Tysflo
Tysflo is a unique OTT video cloud platform that not only provides the tools and technologies to turn content owners and publishers into enterprise grade broadcasters, but also removes the monetization guessing game by integrating ad sales monetization solutions on behalf of advertising clients into its offering. Whether its live, pop-up, or scheduled channels, Video on Demand libraries of archived content, or just UGC, for corporate or brand, Tysflo has proven its ability to enable publishers to rapidly integrate all varieties of content, to become a channel, and with real results that grow audiences and revenue. Tysflo ‘wow’s with its content navigation capabilities across hosted publishers, making for a intuitive user driven content exploration experience on their terms, by content genre.
Both publishers and content owners have been long frustrated with the poor monetization, content clutter, ad irrelevance, lack of audience growth, and the inability to curate a habit creating destination for their audiences using the either big Internet companies and social networks, or wholesale OTT technologies. All have also been long frustrated with broadcaster incumbent’s inability to openly and fairly cater for all content, even in niche sports. Tysflo opens the content world to South Africa, and publishers can now have a true content destination that they own. Tysflo enables all this and more, with its patented, and South African developed video cloud OTT platform technologies.
Tysflo operates out of its custom built Internet cloud in South Africa and has plans to extend offerings into Africa.
Tysflo is a completely unique content ecosystem, and its arrival in SA is perfectly timed for the changing of the content guard in South Africa.
About Teraco Data Environments
Teraco is the first provider of resilient, vendor neutral data environments in South Africa. Clients benefit from the cost savings and improved resilience of securely housing their information systems and networking equipment in a colocation facility purpose-built and operated to global best practice by an expert organisation with an absolute focus on data centre technology and infrastructure.
Founded in 2008, Teraco Data Environments has brought international best practice in vendor neutral data centre management to South Africa to give businesses a technically superior, physically safer and lower cost environment for their information systems.
As the local telecommunications market began to deregulate, Teraco's founders recognised an opportunity for a truly vendor neutral data centre offering in South Africa. The possibility of providing a service that was not tied to any Carrier or ISP became not only technically feasible and economically viable, but increasingly desirable to South African enterprises which needed unrestricted choice in how they interconnected their facilities and connected to the Internet.
Teraco manage colocation data centres in Cape Town , Durban and Johannesburg . Teraco is backed by leading international investors Permira. Teraco is a Level 3 contributor (DTI Codes).