(Kyodo News International via NewsEdge) NTT Communications and Transtelecom of Russia have struck a deal to lay a fiber optic cable network between Hokkaido and Sakhalin.
NTT Communications said it will try to respond to an increase in demand among corporate clients for fast-speed data transmissions between Japan and Europe as well as Japan and Russia.
The 500-kilometer high-capacity undersea cable will be connected between Ishiakari in northern Japan and Nevelsk in Russia's Far East by the end of 2007, the two companies said.
The network will transmit data at up to 640Gbps, they said.
NTT Communications president Hiromi Wasai and his counterpart Sergey Lipatov inked a memorandum of understating on the project at Japan's Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, attended by Norihisa Tamura, senior vice minister at the ministry, and Russian Information Technologies and Communications Minister Leonid Reiman.
Transtelecom, a wholly owned subsidiary of Russian Railways, has a network with a total length of more than 50,000 km in Russia, Europe and China along the Siberian railway.
The signing took place on the occasion of Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov's two-day visit to Japan, on which he is being accompanied by about 70 Russian business leaders.
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