Connectivity Chronicles: Bridging borders through network expansion in Mexico

From Quebec to Querétaro and Montreal to Merida, we’re one of the few global Internet carriers to operate our own backbone network across North America down to Mexico. While Mexico is best known for ancient ruins, delicious cuisine, rich culture and gleaming beaches, the country has experienced a recent economic boom fueled by its growing manufacturing, nearshoring and Information Communications Technology (ICT) sectors.

However, the region has had a long road to this recent growth, with the digital divide previously preventing equitable access to technology and communications services. Affordable fixed-line Internet only became available in the past decade, with the country reforming its telecommunications market in 2013 to foster competition and investment from Tier 1 connectivity providers.

Arelion was one of the first global Internet carriers to support Mexico’s connectivity market following telecommunications reforms, building many new routes and Points-of-Presence (PoPs) in strategic locations throughout the region since then. Our network expansion in the country seeks to strengthen Mexico’s local cloud and application ecosystem while empowering local service providers with more resilient Tier 1 connectivity than Mexico’s aging legacy infrastructure.

Ultimately, our network expansion in Mexico bolsters the region’s economic growth, spurring digital transformation in numerous industries while allowing governments to provide public services through low-latency, reliable connectivity.

Let’s examine Mexico’s key market drivers and our infrastructure footprint in this booming region.

Under the magnifying glass: Our network footprint in Mexico

Our network in Mexico is vast and constantly expanding, currently totaling 9 regional PoPs and numerous routes. Recent additions include:

• San Luis Potosi: 1 diverse, fully resilient PoP (Neutral Networks)
• Monterrey: 2 diverse IP PoPs (Neutral Networks and Equinix MO1)
• Querétaro: 2 diverse IP PoPs (Equinix MX1 and KIO QRO)
• Mexico City: 2 diverse IP PoPs (KIO MEX2 and KIO MEX5)
• Merida: 1 IP PoP (AiTelecom)
• Guadalajara: 1 diverse PoP (HostDime

New DWDM Route From Monterrey to Querétaro
Our most recent network expansion in Mexico includes a Dense wavelength-division multiplexing (DWDM) route from Monterrey to Querétaro. Following our recent cross-border build-out from the U.S. to Monterrey, this new route continues our mission to strengthen Mexico’s local content ecosystem while supporting global cloud, media and gaming providers through low-latency service delivery to end users in the region.

This network expansion reduces the risk of service outages by offering reliable connectivity options to current legacy infrastructure while improving customer experiences and supporting content localization in Querétaro. This new route also offers end-to-end connectivity on Arelion’s fiber backbone to markets such as Northern Virginia, Silicon Valley, Dallas and Atlanta.

Monterrey is home to 11 percent of Mexico’s startups. It is the country’s second-strongest startup ecosystem, with major manufacturers like Boeing, Dell, Mercedes Benz and others also establishing operations centers in the region. This economic growth increasingly positions Monterrey as a gateway to American markets, particularly amid Mexico’s expanding base of middle-class workers and end users.

Querétaro, strategically located in central Mexico near Mexico City, has low susceptibility to earthquakes. Querétaro is leading Mexico’s data center boom, with studies estimating that 73 data centers will be established in the region by 2029 and that 15 percent of Mexico’s total data center footprint is in Querétaro. Querétaro is also an aerospace manufacturing hub, seeing $129 million in investment in 2023.

Our Querétaro Points-of-Presence (PoPs) serve as centralized hubs supporting access to content and applications for customers in Guadalajara, San Luis Potosi and Merida.

Guadalajara PoP at HostDime
We announced our Guadalajara PoP at HostDime’s site in November 2023. This PoP avoids backhauling from the United States to enable improved customer experiences through direct, low-latency access to our Tier-1 network. Jalisco leads Mexico in nearshoring demand, comprising 47 percent of the country’s total demand, with electronics and cybernetics accounting for 75 percent of Jalisco’s production of goods. With this new PoP, we positioned ourselves as a reliable connectivity partner for multinational enterprises in Guadalajara’s thriving technology sectors, spurring economic growth and job opportunities.

San Luis Potosi PoP at Neutral Networks
We announced our San Luis Potosi PoP at Neutral Networks’ site in September 2023, continuing our ongoing expansion to support underserved edge markets. San Luis Potosi’s industrial manufacturing sector is thriving, with automotive, subassembly and electronics enterprises announcing nearshoring investments, including BMW’s $868 million electric car plant and other investments by TECCO and Taxan.

Experts estimate nearshoring will generate 700,000 jobs in Mexico by 2024 and add $50 billion to Mexico’s GDP over the next six years (MEXICONOW). This PoP provides the region’s industrial sectors with direct, local connectivity to our #1 ranked Internet backbone and ecosystem of cloud, content and security solutions, enabling further nearshoring investment.

Cloud Footprint in Mexico
In addition to providing terabit-scale optical transport services and Tier-1 IP connectivity, we’ve also expanded our cloud footprint in Mexico through partnerships with top cloud providers. In November 2023, we announced that we now offer direct connectivity to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) via OCI FastConnect in the new Oracle Cloud Monterrey Region in Mexico. This capability enables Oracle’s customers to harness the power of OCI locally and leverage OCI’s offerings to unlock innovation and business growth.

We also announced direct connectivity to the Oracle Cloud Querétaro region via OCI FastConnect in September 2022, providing customers with self-provisioned, flexible and scalable private network connectivity to OCI FastConnect locations.

Querétaro is a central interconnection hub for cloud and data center providers. It’s also Mexico’s fastest-growing city due to its booming IT, logistics services, aircraft manufacturing, maintenance and automotive industries. These cloud regions serve the digital transformation needs of diverse industries through resilient, direct connection to Oracle cloud services.

Stay tuned for the next installment in our Connectivity Chronicles series, where we’ll explore how our East Coast routes and PoPs serve growing markets and subsea landing stations along America’s eastern seaboard.

Johan Ottosson, VP Strategy & Product Management