CIT deployed two on-campus caching systems during summer 2012. Google Global Cache speeds up Google services, including news, maps and search. UB also recently partnered with the Akamai Accelerated Network, which provides content for many popular sites, including CNN. While each vendor maintains their servers remotely, UB provides space, cooling and power for the CDN edge servers in our data centers.

As a result of these CDNs, website response times at UB have significantly improved, with download speeds up by approximately 400%. Having an on-site CDN also allows Internet bandwidth reductions, providing savings over time as caching rates continue to increase. Through the caching initiative, UB is saving approximately 300Mbps at peak, which translates to 20% of the total bandwidth used. As demand for high bandwidth media grows, so does the benefit to UB.

The on-campus CDNs were recently put to the test on September 19, when Apple released their latest version of iOS software. Universities across the country saw their Internet bandwidth skyrocket, causing slowness and visible outages. During this timeframe, the cache at UB served close to 1Gbps, with the Internet link remaining unaffected.