LISTED mobile-services operator Globe Telecom Inc. and its international partners have started the construction of a $250-million undersea-cable system, which will directly connect the Southeast Asian (SEA) region to the United States.
The global consortium composed of Globe, PT. Telekomunikasi Indonesia International (Telin), RAM Telecom International (RTI), Hawaiian Telcom, Teleguam Holdings (GTA), GTI Corp. and Telkom USA, are jointly investing in the SEA-US Submarine Cable System to link the five areas and territories of Manado in Indonesia, Davao in Southern Philippines, Piti in the territory of Guam, and Honolulu in the island of Oahu, Hawaii; and Los Angeles, California, in the continental US.
The system will be approximately 15,000 kilometers in length, stretched along a unique route and has been designed and engineered to bypass earthquake-prone areas in East Asia, thereby providing a strategic diversity in the range of connectivity to trans-Pacific networks with ensured stable connectivity.
The cable system will provide an initial 20-terabit-per-second (Tb/s) capacity, with state-of-the-art 100-Gigabit-per-second (Gb/s) technology.
This capacity will help to meet the exponentially growing demand for bandwidth between SEA and North America in unparalleled performance, especially for those two Asean countries.
With further connectivity using existing and planned submarine cable systems in the region, other countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei Darussalam, Papua New Guinea, and Australia can enjoy the benefit of the SEA-US cable system.
“This cable construction is significant as it is one of the biggest milestones for Indonesia’s rapid growth in communications. It demonstrates Telin’s commitment to provide Indonesian consumers with state-of-the-art global infrastructure development. Our objective is now closer with SEA-US given that it is the first cable system with direct connection from Indonesia to USA, where most of the Internet’s content is sourced,” Telin President Director Syarif Syarial Ahmad said.
The frequent use of high-bandwidth Internet in Indonesia is ranging from business, where video conference is highly utilized in many offices, as well as entertainment, where video and TV streaming have become part of Indonesians’ casual activities.
“The SEA-US project will enable Globe to play a major role in providing superior connectivity for consumers and businesses in the Philippines to connect to the US. Our link-up with the SEA-US cable system will serve the exponential growth of mobile Internet use in our country, enabling the Filipino digital lifestyle and wonderful experience for our customers and businesses,” Globe Executive Vice President and COO Gil B. Genio said.
Globe’s total commitment for the project is $85 million.
“This development will also benefit the outsourcing and offshoring industry, including major contact centers, business-process-outsourcing providers, global-financial institutions and a host of other multinationals that require very large bandwidth as the Philippines has become the preferred destination for these companies,” Genio said.
RTI CEO Russ Matulich said the undersea-cable system will help his company meet the diverse needs of telecommunications carriers, large multinational enterprises, content providers and government entities looking to connect over 1.5 billion businesses and consumers in the SEA region.
“RTI is proud to work with industry-leading partners to build what will be the fastest cable connecting Southeast Asia with the United States. SEA-US’s essential Asia-US route diversity, lower latency and onward connectivity options via Hawaii and Guam will enable RTI to offer unmatched services to transpacific connectivity customers,” he said.
Hawaiian Telcom President and CEO Eric K. Yeaman said the cable system will help “facilitate economic opportunity and growth for Hawaii’s residents and businesses. Hawaii is no different from the rest of the world in its need and desire for more bandwidth and the SEA-US system will ensure our trans-Pacific capacity needs are met both now and well into the future.”
The Filipino telco is also a member of an international consortium of telecommunications and technology companies operating the SEA-Japan Cable (SJC) system.
SJC is an 8,900-kilometer cable system linking seven territories that include Brunei, mainland China, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and the Philippines. It also has the option to link with Thailand.
The cable infrastructure is currently being upgraded to bring an increase of 6.5-Tb/s capacity with the state-of-the-art 100-G technology.
Aside from the SJC cable system, Globe has also made investments in the East Asia Cable system, Asia Pacific Cable Network-2, Tata Global Network–Intra Asia cable system, the City to City cable system and is interconnected with major trans-Pacific cable systems, which encompasses the Unity, Tata Global Network-Pacific, and the Japan-US Cable Network.
Existing domestic-cable systems of Globe, catering to transmission requirement connecting Luzon to various islands in the Visayas and Mindanao, include the Fiber Optic Backbone Network 1 (FOBN1), FOBN2 and FOBN3, composed of the Boracay, Palawan and Coron submarine-cable systems.
