Telecommunications in Ireland operate in a regulated competitive market that provides customers with a wide array of advanced digital services. This article explores Ireland's telecommunications infrastructure including: fixed and mobile networks, The voice, data and Internet services, cable television, developments in next-generation networks and broadcast networks for radio and television.
The London Internet Exchange ("LINX") is a mutually governed Internet exchange point (IXP) that provides peering services and public policy representation to network operators. It was founded in 1994 in London. LINX operates IXPs in London, Manchester, Scotland and Wales in the United Kingdom and Northern Virginia in the United States.
Internet Neutral Exchange (INEX) is an Internet exchange located in the Republic of Ireland, operating three VLANs at points of presence in Dublin at Equinix DB1 - Citywest, BT - Citywest, Equinix DB2 - Kilcarbery Park, Interxion DUB1 and DUB2 - Park West and Equinix DB3 - Northwest Business Park, Ballycoolin and a separate exchange, INEX Cork, at CIX in Cork.
The Amsterdam Internet Exchange (AMS-IX) is an Internet exchange point based in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands. Established in the early 1990s, AMS-IX is a non-profit, neutral and independent peering point.
Green computing, green IT, or ICT sustainability, is the study and practice of environmentally sustainable computing or IT.
Equinix, Inc. is an American multinational company headquartered in Redwood City, California, that specializes in Internet connection and data centers. The company is a leader in global colocation data center market share, with 260 data centers in 33 countries on five continents.
Telecity Group plc, was a European carrier-neutral datacentre and colocation centre provider. It specialised in the design, build and management of datacentre space. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange until it was acquired by Equinix in January 2016.
Internet usage in Ireland was reported at a 95% rate among individuals by 2022, higher than the European Union (EU) average of 89%. According to the European Commission's Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI) 2023 report, 70% of Irish adults had at least basic digital skills in 2021, above the EU average of 54%. Additionally, 77% demonstrated basic digital content creation skills, exceeding the EU average of 66%. Ireland's National Digital Strategy, along with the 10-year Adult Literacy for Life strategy, aims to enhance digital competencies across the workforce and society.
Digital Realty is a real estate investment trust that owns, operates and invests in carrier-neutral data centers across the world. The company offers data center, colocation and interconnection services.
Interxion is a provider of carrier and cloud-neutral colocation data centre services in Europe. Founded in 1998 in the Netherlands, the firm was publicly listed on the New York Stock Exchange from 28 January 2011 until its acquisition by Digital Realty in March 2020. Interxion is headquartered in Schiphol-Rijk in the Netherlands, and operates 53 data centres in 11 European countries located in major metropolitan areas, including Dublin, London, Frankfurt, Paris, Amsterdam, and Madrid, the six main data centre markets in Europe, as well as Marseille, Interxion’s Internet Gateway.
OVH, legally OVH Groupe SA, is a French cloud computing company which offers VPS, dedicated servers and other web services. As of 2016 OVH owned the world's largest data center in surface area. As of 2019, it was the largest hosting provider in Europe, and the third largest in the world based on physical servers. The company was founded in 1999 by the Klaba family and is headquartered in Roubaix, France. In 2019 OVH adopted OVHcloud as its public brand name.
Backbone Connect is a London-based internet service provider. Its services include cyber security, cloud computing, connectivity, communication and voice, wide area networks, internet access and colocation services to businesses in the UK, Europe and North America. It also provides resilient digital infrastructure for commercial property assets and long-term IT support for tenants.
In computing, hyperscale is the ability of an architecture to scale appropriately as increased demand is added to the system.
France-IX is a Paris-based Internet exchange point (IXP) founded in June 2010 as a membership organisation. As of 21 July 2021 it interconnects more than 496 members, making it the largest IXP in France.
In computer networking, a bare-metal server is a physical computer server that is used by one consumer, or tenant, only. Each server offered for rental is a distinct physical piece of hardware that is a functional server on its own. They are not virtual servers running in multiple pieces of shared hardware.
CISPE is a non-profit trade association for infrastructure as a service (IaaS) cloud providers in Europe. It was started to aid IaaS providers in explaining their business model to policymakers.
Pulsant is a digital edge infrastructure provider, specialising in cloud, colocation and connectivity services.
Teraco Data Environments is a carrier-, cloud- and vendor-neutral data centre provider founded by Tim Parsonson and Lex van Wyk in 2008. On 1 August 2022, Digital Realty announced that it had completed the purchase of a majority stake in Teraco, previously controlled by Berkshire Partners, Permira and a group of investors.
Data Economy is an international technology business news and opinion website, magazine and broadcaster founded in 2016. The media outlet is headquartered in London, UK and focuses on the business strategy and finance and investment within the IT infrastructure space, mainly data centres.
Gaia-X is an initiative to develop a federated secure data infrastructure for Europe, whereby data are shared, with users retaining control over their data access and usage, and according to some to ensure European digital sovereignty. It aims to develop digital governance, based on European values of transparency, openness, data protection, and security, which can be applied to cloud technologies to obtain transparency and controllability across data and services. The project name is a reference to the Greek goddess Gaia.
