The island’s economy could be boosted with the development of a new ’keep it local’ internet exchange attracting digital businesses.

That’s the view of the founder of the new not-for-profit exchange who believes it will help raise the island’s status and put the island’s footprint on a digital map of similar exchanges around the world.

He also believes that in the long term it will be of benefit to island residents with faster online communications.

And he is looking for backing from datacentres and internet service providers for the exchange.

Manx IX founder Professor Adam Beaumont is also the chief executive of island based BlueWave Communications. He was also the co-founder of the UK’s first outside-of-London exchange in Leeds in 2008.

He said the Yorkshire development transformed digital growth and attracted high profile businesses to Leeds, notably the move of Channel 4 from London and he believes the island could benefit in a similar way by attracting global names here.

Professor Beaumont, who is the founder and chief executive of Bluewave’s parent company aql, said: ’Having an internet exchange on the island not only makes traffic routing more efficient, keeping local traffic moving quickly and efficiently between island residents on the island, but also provides better quality access to media content.’

He told Business News: ’The Isle of Man has a really great aspiration to grow its digital economy but you can’t do that unless you can bring down the raw cost of internet access and create more of a competitive marketplace in that supply chain, and that’s what this exchange does.

’This is a step in growing the digital economy.’

Asked by Business News if he envisages whether the exchange could attract more businesses to the island he said: ’Oh yes for sure.’

He says the exchange would bring down the cost of internet access. The cost was the ’only barrier’ preventing large global businesses that need huge global capacity from moving to the Isle of Man.

’So we are breaking down that barrier.’

As an example he said the cost of raw internet access in the island was much greater than that in a major UK city such as Leeds or London.

’So if you are a business that uses the internet as its lifeblood it makes it very difficult for you to move to the Isle of Man.

’The Isle of Man obviously has tax and regulatory advantages for businesses but if that is impedimented by the cost of the raw material which is data then they won’t move there. So relieving that barrier is key.’

He said other benefits of a local exchange included being able to help keep traffic operating in the island should there be a loss of off-island connectivity and decreasing the reliability on London-based infrastructure.

Professor Beaumont who is the chairman of ManxIX added: ’While the island has strong digital aspirations, these cannot be achieved whilst the cost of global connectivity remains high. To bring down this cost, we must create a competitive marketplace on the island.

’An internet exchange is an important first move in this initiative. A few short years after establishing the exchange in Leeds, the costs of wholesale data dropped to the same low prices as the major European internet cities such as London, Frankfurt and Amsterdam. We want to do the same for the island.’

Founding board member Shelley Langan-Newton, who is also managing director of BlueWave in the island, said: ’As the use of the internet continues to increase at a rapid rate, so does the need for networks to be able to exchange traffic more effectively.

’ManxIX also brings great value to the island by attracting some of the biggest network operators in need of interconnection capability to the Isle of Man. We’re also on the lookout for new board members to join us on our quest for the good of the internet.’

The new exchange has met with approval from a leading member of the government.

Treasury Minister Alfred Cannan MHK, said: ’The Isle of Man is home to a rapidly expanding digital industry, particularly in new technologies such as AI, Blockchain and Reg-Tech.

’The exchange will allow faster routing of internet traffic on the island, providing more efficient video collaboration, better access to high definition content and also provide an important component in rolling out 5G connectivity.

’The internet exchange is a great example of private sector co-operation for the benefit of all.’

Writing on Twitter, Joe Hughes, chief executive of the Manx Technology Group, said: ’I tried to get this off the ground in 2016 with the Manx Internet Exchange, but it failed to gain traction with many of the IoM datacentres and ISPs. Let’s hope times have changed & @BlueWave IoM and their parent @aql can make it work, so that others join!’

Island internet entrepreneur Jason Scales said on â??Twitter: ’I’ve loved the idea of an exchange on the island and it’s very welcome, trust me. Traditionally they’d be operated independent of any network provider and I’d love to see a roadmap of how it’ll work. Genuinely excited for BW/AQL about this.’

l Meanwhile BlueWave is expecting very shortly to erect a new 40-metre telecommunications tower at the former BBC transmitter site located at the top of Carnane in Douglas.

The operator was granted planning permission last autumn.

The new tower on the site replaces the existing shorter tower.

BlueWave says it will have a huge wireless reach, boosting the number of business and residential addresses reached.

l Professor Beaumont said BlueWave is looking to recruit more people including software developers.