Cogent: Qwest asking too much for long-haul assets | Unfiltered

Cogent Communications (NasdaqGS: CCOI) examined the long-haul assets of Qwest Communications (NYSE: Q) and opted not to pursue an acquisition of them because the asking price was too high relative …

ITC Deltacom (10.0%, 23 Votes). RCN Metro (8.0%, 18 Votes). TW Telecom (7.0%, 16 Votes). Someone else (6.0%, 14 Votes). Zayo (6.0%, 14 Votes). Cogent Communications (5.0%, 12 Votes). Nobody at all (4.0%, 10 Votes). Total Voters: 223 …

ITC Deltacom (10.0%, 23 Votes). RCN Metro (8.0%, 18 Votes). TW Telecom (7.0%, 16 Votes). Someone else (6.0%, 14 Votes). Zayo (6.0%, 14 Votes). Cogent Communications (5.0%, 12 Votes). Nobody at all (4.0%, 10 Votes). Total Voters: 223 …

ITC Deltacom (10.0%, 23 Votes). RCN Metro (8.0%, 18 Votes). TW Telecom (7.0%, 16 Votes). Someone else (6.0%, 14 Votes). Zayo (6.0%, 14 Votes). Cogent Communications (5.0%, 12 Votes). Nobody at all (4.0%, 10 Votes). Total Voters: 223 …

Cogent Communications (NasdaqGS: CCOI) examined the long-haul assets of Qwest Communications (NYSE: Q) and opted not to pursue an acquisition of them because the asking price was too high relative …

UPDATED With Comments From Sprint: Cogent Communications, one of the largest bandwidth providers in the world, charged that Sprint-Nextel has severed its network from Cogent’s networks. This could cause network slowdown and decrease in web performance. In a statement today, the company said that Sprint unpeered from Cogent’s network at 4:30 p.m. on October 31 30, 2008. Peering is a voluntary process where two networks exchange equal amount of data amongst each other without actually paying each other.  

“It is no longer possible for many Sprint customers and Cogent customers to directly communicate across the Internet,” Cogent said, and alleged that Sprint was in “violation of a contractual obligation to exchange Internet traffic with Cogent on a settlement free peering basis.” The two companies are in litigation over the issue.

I will try and talk to both companies in the morning, but I just wonder if Sprint is the only party to blame here. Cogent, based in Washington, D.C., has been involved in similar unpeering spats with Level 3, Telia and other operators.

Update: Here is a response from Sprint that shows that the situation isn’t as simple as Cogent tries to paint it.  ”In 2006, Sprint and Cogent entered into a commercial trial agreement. Cogent failed to satisfy Sprint’s peering criteria and refused to pay Sprint to stay connected to our network. Sprint notified Cogent well in advance that it would disconnect Cogent unless it paid, and Cogent refused. As a result of Cogent’s refusal, Sprint was forced to terminate the commercial interconnection agreement and disconnect its network from Cogent’s.”  

The Sprint spokesperson said that, “Cogent’s posturing in this case is nothing more than an effort to divert attention away from its’ contractual obligations, and this is the latest in a growing list of peering-related disputes between Cogent and Internet backbone providers.”

In the past, these problems have arisen because one of the two network operators felt that they needed to be compensated for the the traffic they were sending to the other. Cogent CEO Dave Schaffer in an interview earlier this year said that carriers hate them because they don’t like “our low-price pricing policy except our customers, and most of the companies have been reluctant peers with us.”

Cogent says that any “Sprint-Nextel wireline customer that is unable to connect to Cogent’s customers a free 100 megabit per second connection to the Internet for as long as Sprint continues to keep this partitioning of the Internet in place.”

Telia-Soneran asiakkaiden nettiyhteydet ulkomaille, erityisesti USA:han, ovat osittain poikki. Syynä on maksukiista amerikkalaisen yhteistyökumppanin kanssa. Runko-operaattori Cogent Communications haluaisi ilmeisesti rahaa Telia-Soneran asiakkaiden yhteyksien välittämisestä.

Sekä Hesari että Tietokone-lehti huomauttavat, että Telia-Sonera ei ole toistaiseksi tiedottanut tilanteesta nettisivuillaan. Totesin hetki sitten, että tiedotetta ei ole Telia-Soneran Suomen eikä Ruotsin sivuilla. Ulkomaiset lähteet sen sijaan kertovat Telia-Soneran asiakkailleen lähettämästä englanninkielisestä tiedotteesta:

Dear Customer,
We would like to give you the following information:
Cogent has decided not to exchange traffic directly with TeliaSonera’s AS 1299 or indirectly with AS 1299 through a third-party provider. As a result, Cogent has partitioned the Internet and disrupted the flow of traffic between Cogent and TeliaSonera customers.
While this has a negative impact on some users of the Internet, this effect is the result of Cogent’s decision and is unfortunately beyond TeliaSonera’s control. Until Cogent rectifies this situation, TeliaSonera customers experiencing any difficulty reaching Cogent’s network can continue to purchase IP Transit from TeliaSonera along with another Tier 1 provider. This will fix the immediate problem and ensure optimal connectivity going forward.

We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused…

If you have further concerns, please address your commercial contact at TeliaSonera

Cogent Communications on kunnostautunut ennenkin vastaavien tempausten järjestäjänä. Gigaom:

Cogent had previously gotten into a slugfest with Level 3 Communications. Cogent’s stance towards Telia is hypocritical. Here is a press release they issued back in 2005 when complaining about Level3. As a reader points out, Cogent has been involved in such spats with other carriers as well. OpenTransit (France Telecom), Teleglobe, ATDN are some of those who have had Cogent issues.

Samasta asiasta kirjoittaa myös Sune Christessen:

Cogent er kendt for at have ufatteligt billigt transit samt for at være involverede i en længere række internetskandaler når de har stoppet peering med andre store udbydere, og dermed forårsaget utilgængelighed for deres egne samt konkurrentens kunder. Mest velkendt er episoden i 2005 hvor Cogent og Level 3 stoppede med at peer’e, men tidligere har også AOL, France Telecom samt en lang række mindre udydere fået kniven af Cogent.

Ikävintä koko jupakassa on se, että molempien yhtiöiden asiakkaat joutuvat siitä kärsimään, vaikka eivät ole lainkaan asianosaisia. Jos operaattorit laajemminkin ryhtyvät Cogentin tavoin vetämään töpselin pois seinästä, niin Internet lakkaa olemasta sellaisena kuin se tänään tunnetaan. Siitä ei tietenkään hyödy kukaan, ei edes Cogent.