St Kitts and Nevis Powers Up the Caribbean's Newest Internet Exchange Point

It’s a big weekend for St Kitts and Nevis, with the fortieth anniversary independence celebrations carded for September 19. And that may not be the only reason for folks there to smile.

The recent launch in Basseterre of an Internet exchange point could also bring some welcome improvements to users’ Internet service. The latest development in the country’s digital landscape brings the promise of better, faster, more resilient Internet connectivity for everyone.

An internet exchange point, or IXP, is a piece of infrastructure that allows computer network operators to interconnect directly and exchange traffic locally, without resorting to slower, more expensive international routes. There are hundreds of IXPs in the world, with more than a dozen already across the Caribbean, including in Belize, Curacao, Grenada, Haiti, Saint Barthélemy, Sint Maarten, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago, and ongoing development work in Guadeloupe.

The St Kitts and Nevis Internet Exchange Point, or SKNIX, is the region’s latest. It was launched on September 12 at the ninth Caribbean Peering and Internet Connection Forum (CarPIF), in St Kitts Marriott Resort, Frigate Bay.

“A local IXP translates to cost savings for IXP members and increased network reliability for Internet users,” said Bevil Wooding, Director of Caribbean Affairs at the American Registry for Internet Numbers and coordinator of CarPIF.

SKNIX is hosted at the National ICT Center in Basseterre, which is also home to the Government of St. Kitts and Nevis’ Department of Information Technology. SKNIX’s listed members include the St Kitts and Nevis government, ArkiTechs Inc., and Internet service providers Cable and Wireless, City Wifi, Digicel, and The Cable.

“From a provider’s point of view, for the Internet, there’s a cost that we have to pay to an external party every single time you use the Internet. Everything goes out of St Kitts and back again. And we have to pay for that, because we don’t own that subsea, that underwater cable. So when we can stop the local traffic having to go overseas, we can reduce our cost, and we can pass that on to you, the consumer,” said Patricia Walters, chief executive officer of The Cable.

The SKNIX launch has been years in the making. Since 2010, a cross-section of government and private sector stakeholders have been working with the Caribbean Network Operators Group (CaribNOG), a volunteer community of regional Internet development experts.

Rodney Taylor, Secretary General of the Caribbean Telecommunications Union, said on Monday that SKNIX “could not be successfully delivered without working closely with CaribNOG and the network of technical experts they bring together.”

Konris Maynard, government minister with responsibility for information and communications technology, and Ophelia Blanchard, acting director of the government’s Department of Technology, attended the formal SKNIX launch, alongside representatives of the CaribNOG team that spearheaded the technical implementation, including Stephen Lee, team lead, Brent McIntosh, technical services lead, Claire Craig, research director, and Steve Spence, senior network engineer. 

“CaribNOG will continue to support the strengthening of critical Internet infrastructure and to promote the creation of local digital content, including electronic government services, both here in St Kitts and Nevis, and across the wider Caribbean region. Our commitment to developing the Caribbean digital landscape transcends into forever,” said Stephen Lee, CEO of Arkitechs Inc. and co-founder of CaribNOG.

SKNIX is also expected to lay the foundation for the development of local internet services such as colocation and local content development, hosting and distribution. The hope now is that the establishment of a local IXP will catalyze the delivery of online services across several industries, including banking, justice, health, agriculture and tourism.