1. Tusu Tusubira, CEO, UbuntuNet Alliance Presentation to CLARA
UbuntuNet Alliance and AfricaConnect
Tusu Tusubira, CEO, UbuntuNet Alliance
Presentation to CLARA

2. Alliance Membership (14) Southern Sudan (de facto)
REN Growth in Africa
Alliance Membership (14)
DRC
EthERNet, Ethiopia
*KENET, Kenya
*MAREN, Malawi
*MoRENet, Mozambique
XNet, Namibia
*RwEdNet, Rwanda
SomaliREN, Somalia
SudREN, Sudan
Southern Sudan (de facto)
*TENET, South Africa
TERNET, Tanzania
RENU, Uganda
ZAMREN, Zambia
ASREN
(1 year old)
WACREN
(2 years old)
UbuntuNet Alliance
(6 years old)

4. UbuntuNet Alliance 2006: Formally incorporated
as a non-profit association
in the City of Amsterdam
5 founding NRENs: KENET, MAREN, MoRENet, RwEdNet, TENET
Board elected by Member NRENs
Chair + CEO + 7 independent directors
Head office in Lilongwe, Malawi
2012: Incorporating as a Trust in Malawi
Will retain Dutch entity as a subsidiary

5. Growth, leading to AfricaConnect
2006 – first approach to EU by the Alliance
Initial Focus: Starting NRENs and ensuring readiness of campus and NREN networks
Engagement of cable providers, leading to major educational discounts by SEACOM, + IRUs
POP (router donated by Cisco) established in London, connected to GÉANT – enabled NRENs to connect using own international capacity
Feasibility study by EUC: led to UbuntuNet Alliance as the target of AfricaConnect (cf ALICE)
Note: the data network is called UbuntuNet

6. Capacity Building a Priority
Just in time capacity building
Based on justified requests
Targeted at NREN staff
Encourages twinning (South-South and South-North), e.g. KENET-DFN; RENU-SurfNET
Approaches: Attachment; Secondment; Workshop style
Participating NRENs must be in good standing in terms of payment of dues and agreed contributions

7. Sustainability a Key Principle

8. Current Operations AMSIX LINX UbuntuNet, Amsterdam UbuntuNet London
Internet
UbuntuNet London
UbuntuNet, Mtunzini
LINX
Géant
AMSIX
UbuntuNet, Amsterdam
KENET
ZAMREN
MoRENet
TENET
TERNET 8

9. Operations: IP services to NRENs
Worldwide REN connectivity via Géant
Worldwide commodity Internet
BUT not delivered in Africa!!!
Delivered in London (or Amsterdam)
AfricaConnect and other initiatives will fix this
Light-path services (see next slide)

10. Growing Traffic – e.g. TENET

11. HartRAO to JIVE light path
2 Gbps light path
Transfers e-VLBI data in real time
HartRAO (Hartebeesthoek Radio-Astronomy Observatory, South Africa)
JIVE: (e-VLBI Dataprocessing at Zwingeloo, Netherlands)
UbuntuNet
Géant+
TENET
SurfNet
HartRAO

12. UbuntuNet Tomorrow
AfricaConnect will build the major part of the UbuntuNet Backbone
However there will be sections that others build
The Backbone will carry traffic to and from all connecting NRENs…
and all gateways.

13. AfricaConnect Contractual structure
UbuntuNet Member NRENs
NO!
YES!

14. Business Principles Sustainability Charges in US Dollars
UbuntuNet responsible for all payments to DANTE
UbuntuNet must recover full costs from Member NRENs
Charges in US Dollars
per month
per Mbps of bandwidth
Geographic Agnosticism
The same base prices apply everywhere

15. Financing the backbone
NRENs must come up with €2.8 million
Each NREN asked to commit to €280k
Treated as advance payments for services to be rendered by UbuntuNet
Proper contract between NREN and UbuntuNet UbuntuNet obliged to deliver these services
Discounted unit charges
Creates positive incentive for NREN’s to do it
Other NRENs pay full base price

16. Tomorrow’s basic REN services
Regional REN connectivity
Connection at specified b/w to UbuntuNet backbone
IP interconnectivity with other African NRENs
Initially, only other UbuntuNet NRENs
Later, also WACREN and ASREN NRENs
International Transit
Delivered at backbone port; or
Delivered at London or Amsterdam

17. Regional RENs: Bringing Africa Together
Internet
Géant and RENs worldwide
UbuntuNet
WACREN
ASREN

18. “Glue” NRENs
An NREN whose geographic location is within membership region of two RREN
(WACREN and UbuntuNet)
SudREN (ASREN and UbuntuNet)
Principles agreed:
Regional RENs should not try to avoid overlapping membership regions
Regional RENs should welcome “glue” NRENs as members.

19. Muchas Gracias!
“When the webs of a spider combine, they can trap a lion”
– Ethiopian proverb
Muchas Gracias!