An increasing number of companies and organizations in the LAC region are deploying IPv6 in their networks, and this has led to a considerable increase in the amount of traffic using this Internet protocol in Latin America and the Caribbean.<\/p>\n
LACNIC members know that IPv6 deployment is key for maintaining their level of Internet development.<\/p>\n
During the most recent LACNIC event held in Foz do Igua\u00e7u, Brazil, three professionals responsible for different Internet organizations which pioneered IPv6 deployment shared their views on this issue on the panel titled \u201cCases of Successful IPv6 Deployment in the Region.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alejandro D’Egidio, Chief of Backbone Engineering at Telecentro, one of Argentina\u2019s providers with large ipv6 deployments, noted that this had been a strategic decision since the very beginning. \u201cWe had been preparing for IPv4 exhaustion for a few years, so we decided to immediately deploy IPv6. We needed to gain experience in order to maintain a very high quality service,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
D’Egidio observed that organizations should not be afraid of transitioning from IPv4 to IPv6, and added that for every obstacle they encountered Telecentro \u201cfound a solution.\u201d \u201cMany issues will depend on each company’s specific business. We must work ahead of time on choosing and configuring the technology if we are to avoid the need to replace it in the future. One of the keys is to train every sector so that everyone can participate and be prepared,\u201d said the Argentine engineer.<\/p>\n
Aggressive growth. <\/strong>The experience of Telef\u00f4nica Brasil \u2013\u00a0one of the largest organizations in the country as well as in Latin America and the Caribbean\u00a0\u2013 was directly linked to the growth of its business.<\/p>\n Fabio Scartoni, Engineering Manager at Telef\u00f4nica Brasil, said that they had deployed IPv6 to guarantee the growth of their services in light of IPv4 exhaustion. \u201cWe were experiencing aggressive growth of our broadband services and wanted to make sure that we would be able to continue to expand. NAT might have been a temporary solution to support sales, but it would have been quite temporary, as IPv6 was the final solution,\u201d Scartoni highlighted.<\/p>\n Telef\u00f4nica Brasil has been working with IPv6 for six years and currently handles \u201ca very significant amount\u201d of IPv6 traffic, according to its head of Engineering.<\/p>\n According to Scartori, it wasn’t an easy process. First, they needed to convince the company about an extremely technical and important issue that would not generate any new services. \u201cIPv6 is difficult in that it entails changing the network only to arrive at the same starting point. At the time, people would ask me if IPv6 was going to be the new Y2K bug, whether everyone was saying that addresses would run out but in fact this would never happen. I swore that they would run out and asked them to trust me.\u201d<\/p>\n Once deployment had been decided, Telef\u00f3nica’s Engineering department had to face various technical challenges. \u201cDevice compatibility was a major issue. We worked hard with each model and equipment we sell \u2013\u00a0as well as with each provider\u00a0\u2013 to guarantee their compatibility. We had to go to the lab and perform tests to make sure that when we implemented the service everything would continue to work properly and transparently,\u201d Scartoni noted.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n