Colt Lights Up Second Dublin-London Network Route

Colt has added a second fully operational network route from Dublin to London via Manchester. The high-bandwidth route adds additional capacity and resiliency between the two major European metros.

Colt’s investment strategy is to grow existing infrastructure and create new long-distance routes to address customer demand. Dublin’s data center profile is on the rise and London is a key European hub, making a second route to Dublin for Colt a wise expansion. The announcement follows Colt's launch of another low-latency route from Dublin to London via Birmingham.

The network is a 100 Gbps route providing up to 4.2Tbps network capacity, the equivalent of 280 15Gb HD films every second. It is ready to support both IPv6 and 1000Gbps Ethernet.

Colt’s infrastructure now consists of 29,200 miles, connecting 42 metropolitan area networks, as well as 23,300 miles of transatlantic routes and U.S. presence.

The latest expansion completes a network ring that links the two capital cities and connects hundreds of Ireland-based companies in financial, media and retail sectors to more than 195 European cities. It connects Colt customers to all major business parks in Dublin, 20 data centers in and around the city and provides fiber access to more than 250 buildings.

New routes will launch in the Iberian Peninsula, Northern Europe and the Netherlands later this year. The new network expansions will help address European organizations’ infrastructure concerns. A Tech Deficit research study revealed eight in 10 organizations admitted their current network would not meet business needs in two years’ time.

“With half of the world’s top banks in Ireland, we’re seeing an increasing demand for high-bandwidth connectivity, driven by the move to cloud services and the mission critical nature of data in the digital economy,” said François Eloy, executive vice president of network services at Colt.

Dublin’s data center profile on the rise

Dublin has a growing data center profile, which means connectivity between it and London is growing in importance. It is close to mainland Europe and offers low taxes and a desirable cool climate. Dublin has become one of the top destinations for massive data center construction projects.

Major tech companies Microsoft, Google and Amazon have all built and continue to expand data centers there. European providers Interxion and TelecityGroup are present. Digital Realty recently launched a fourth Dublin data center. SunGard also operates in the market.