Press Release
10th of September, 2003

A new exchange point has been opened for business in Tampere, Finland. The exchange point is called TREX Tampere Region Exchange Oy and it was founded by Axu TM Oy and BaseN Ltd. The project has been prepared in association with the eTampere program.

Internet exchanges are essential to the smooth functioning of the Internet, because the Internet is based on traffic flowing between different Internet Service Providers without delays or interruptions. Most of the traffic between Internet Service Providers flows via Internet Exchange Points.

Redundancy Also A Goal

The new exchange point enables the geographical redistribution of national backup routes in case of hardware failures and other incidents. There is only one other organization that operates Internet Exchange Points in Finland. That other organization is called FICIX Ry and both of its exchanges reside in the greater capital city area.

TREX makes it possible for traffic in Central and Northern Finland to flow via Tampere. Earlier all traffic between different Internet Service Providers was piped through Helsinki.

The whole Internet experience is slowed down considerably if an exchange point is unable to pass on traffic between Internet Service Providers for one reason or another. Email messages take longer to arrive and web pages can't be loaded.

First Customers Already Signed Up

Kalle Lehtinen from EUnet Finland comments their decision: "By joining TREX we are investing in the quality and reliability of the services we provide. We also believe we can gain new customers in the central part of Finland."

TREX opens up new possibilities for Internet Service Providers outside the capital city area. "The threshold of joining an exchange point in Tampere is lower for small providers. TREX will also offer a wider range of services than usual. Most customers will find more than one service of interest at TREX. This means that they will gain more from connecting to TREX than from a membership at a regular Internet exchange point" says Aleksi Suhonen, Axu TM Oy.

"We are in the middle of negotiations with several Internet Service Providers and we believe that most of the bigger Finnish providers will be connected to TREX before the year is out" says Niilo Neuvo, BaseN Ltd.

Research and Development Focus

The exchange aims to provide more than just the basic exchange point services. New exchange point services will be developped and there will also be research projects that concentrate on interoperability and emerging technologies such as IPv6 and DWDM.

This kind of research was not possible before, as the only existing Internet Exchange Point in Finland was too crucial to national internetwork traffic to be used for testing new ideas.

"This is a significant project for the Broadband Engine Program in eTampere. We can gather new ground breaking research endeavours here by combining the strengths of the two universities in Tampere with those of the research centres of the various communications companies located in the area" says Lasse Paananen, Program Director in the said engine program. "TREX enables us to deliver new information into the field of international research in data networking" says professor Jarmo Harju, Tampere University of Technology.

For More Information:

Lasse Paananen, Program Director, eTampere / Broadband Engine Program, +358-40-865 6730

Aleksi Suhonen, Internetworking Consultant, Axu TM Oy, +358-45-670 2048

Niilo Neuvo, CTO, BaseN Ltd, +358-9-5475 1005