Internet Solutions may be feeling the pressure from Teraco’s NAPAfrica. The Dimension Data-owned Internet service provider said on Thursday that it plans to become “more open and actively engaged in peering” after a review of its peering policy and making several changes to promote better interconnection.

Peering is when ISPs exchange traffic with one another directly to benefit each other’s networks. “IS will be taking a more open approach to peering and the overall theme of the revised peering policy is to be simpler and more inclusive,” it said in a statement.

“The advantages of a more open peering policy mean that local traffic will be served more directly to end users of the service, while reducing the amount of traffic that needs to leave our shores in order to access content that is available locally,” IS said.

“By becoming more open and actively engaging in peering, we are creating numerous opportunities that will result in improved user experience by adding resiliency, keeping traffic localised and driving the cost of Internet connectivity down,” said IS chief technology officer Kervin Pillay.

“An open peering policy will allow established network providers to peer with IS that were previously unable to do so. We are also making it simpler for content delivery network (CDN) providers to peer with us.”

Many CDN providers have chosen to peer through NAPAfrica’s open peering facilities in Teraco’s data centres.