ISP Reduces Bandwidth Usage While Increasing Service Speed

SITUATION
The North-Eastern Pennsylvania Telephone Company (NE Telco) was load sharing 2 OC-3 links from Carrier A and Carrier B using iBGP to effectively utilize both links for outgoing access to the internet. The combined total aggregate bandwidth available was 310 Mbps and it was offered to subscribers as Internet connectivity.

Like all ISP's, NE Telco was faced with the growing need to support the ever expanding and bandwidth-hungry applications. The network team determined that the company was approaching close to 100% utilization on its egress links.

A decision had to be made: what should NE Telco do to alleviate the growing congestion on its links?

PROBLEM
It is a well known fact that OC-3 pricing is a lot like real estate -- it's all about location, location, location. The further away from your next-hop carrier you are, the more expensive the loop and port charges will be. NE Telco is located in rural Pennsylvania and the numbers for additional bandwidth started adding up fast.

NE Telco was paying $30,000/month for its 2 OC-3 links -- or a unit cost per megabit (Mbps) of $96.77 per month. The addition of a third OC-3 link would place upward pressure on NE Telco's operational expenditures, forcing the frim to either (a) pass those additional costs on to their existing customers in the form of higher prices, or (b) expand the customer base to offset the rising cost of additional capacity. Both of those options posed hard business decisions for NE Telco and the financial health of the company.

SOLUTION
The network team discovered a better alternative: partner with Blue Coat and reduce the overall utilization on the egress links. This solution would afford a reduction in aggregate traffic on the links, create room for expansion -- while simultaneously bringing internet content closer to their subscribers, effectively reducing latency and providing a faster browsing experience.

RESULTS
A Blue Coat CacheFlow5000 web caching appliance was installed in the network and within a few days, NE Telco witnessed a 30% reduction in internet traffic. By the end of the first week, the gains had moved into the 40% range. By the middle of the second week, daily moving averages hovered between 40% and 50%.

Assuming a fixed unit cost of megabits per second, this meant operational cost of $18,000 to $15,000 per month for the bandwidth used on the OC-3 links -- or about half of what NE Telco had been paying for congested links!

Viewed from another angle, the reduced bandwidth consumption meant that a full OC-3 could be dropped from NE Telco's monthly functional budget -- without sacrificing service to the customers.

NE Telco figured ROI on its CacheFlow5000 investment, or amortization rate, of 11.6 to 9.3 months. CacheFlow5000 proved a wise business investment for this ISP.

To see how much bandwidth you can save, while also improving service speed for your customers, call Blue Coat's authorized integrator of CacheFlow appliances, Milestone Systems, Inc. 

Steve // ask@milestonesystems.com // toll-free 877-771-9510

Ask for the free CacheFlow ROI Calculation.

Click for specs on Blue Coat's CacheFlow appliance

The Blue Coat CacheFlow appliance enables service providers to manage dramatic increases in network traffic and subscriber growth. Utilizing highly effective Web caching technology, CacheFlow appliances save bandwidth on expensive international links and backhaul traffic, while improving the end-user Web experience. Through a scalable architecture of cache farms, service providers can accelerate the delivery of rich Web 2.0 content, large files and video. This significantly reduces infrastructure costs by controlling bandwidth consumption while improving customer satisfaction.

Key Benefits:

• Save Bandwidth
• Accelerate Web 2.0 and Rich Media Delivery
• Ensure Caching Effectiveness
• Filter and Secure Web Traffic
• Scale with User and Traffic Growth
• Manage and Report on Web Traffic
• Carrier-class Service and Support