The AccessKenya Group, Kenya’s leading data and IT services provider, is delighted to report 99.93 per cent network availability in its metro fibre network for the year 2010, demonstrating network reliability as a key benefit of its fibre.
“We are delighted with this extraordinary achievement from our fibre network. To achieve an uptime of 99.93% for the whole year puts our network right up there with the absolute best globally and truly reflects our commitment to our customers to deliver the best and most reliable services in Kenya. As this figure is across our network the reality is that most of our clients on our fibre network enjoyed in excess of 99.99% uptime.” said Mr. Jonathan Somen, the Group Managing Director of AccessKenya.
“We were able to achieve this because we followed global best practices when we built the network. We focused very hard on the design of the network to ensure that our network is very redundant. By building out fibre optic rings, we were able to withstand fibre cuts when they did happen as our customer traffic automatically rerouted around the other side of the ring, ensuring they didn’t experience any downtime. However, we also focused hard on putting in excellent and reliable equipment as well as specifying significant amounts of power backup into each fibre building to ensure that power wouldn’t affect our network and therefore our customers. Finally we also focused hard to ensure that our civil works was done to the highest standard and we ensured that our fibre was deeply buried in the ground to minimize the risk of fibre cuts,” said Somen.
In addition, AccessKenya announced that they experienced 13 fibre cuts during 2010. “Given that we have almost 150 kilometres of fibre serving our 250 buildings, we believe the small number of fibre cuts reflects our commitment to build the network in the best possible way and to ensure that our fibre is as protected as possible. Between our build quality and our redundant rings, we have managed to deliver unrivalled uptime to our customers. “
“This is another significant advantage of our network that we believe puts it far ahead of all the others in the market today. Customers want reliable service, excellent customer service, value for money and guaranteed speeds and this is what we offer,” said Somen.
While announcing the statistics for their fibre network, Somen also indicated that their international redundancy on the submarine fibres also meant that their downtime on their international connectivity was nil. “By providing connectivity to the rest of the world through diverse paths and divserse cable systems, we were able to withstand service outages on the submarine fibre cables and deliver 100% uptime on our international connectivity last year.”
AccessKenya is currently laying out its fibre in Mombasa using the same principle of ring topology and according to Mr. Somen, the Group will maintain the standards it has set for the building of this network, “sticking to best practice in terms of design and implementation.”
According to Somen, the level of service reliability that the Group offers its clients, that range from banking institutions, manufacturing companies, NGOs, educational organisations, real estate and retailers, led to added benefits as an organization as our cost to support our clients was lower on fibre due to the high reliability of the network.
“There were many happy clients with our services in 2010 as a result of our excellent quality service and we are seeing this trend continue in 2011 as we receive many referrals and new customers coming to AccessKenya including a number of very large customers who are connecting to our network to link their branch offices at high speed,” added Somen.
The Group also has a significant Wi-Max network in Kenya, as well as a long established Motorola wireless network with thousands of square kilometers of coverage with experience in providing network services now spanning 8 years.
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