Here's a quick roundup of some global news from under the waves from this week:
SEA-ME-WE 5 has now reached the shores of Europe. Telecom Italia Sparkle has announced that the shore end at its landing station in Catania on the island of Sicily is now complete. There's a lot left to do still though on what will be a 3-fiber-pair, 20,000km cable system landing in 17 countries. The whole thing is planned to be ready for service by the end of 2016.
That's not all the news on the Europe-Asia bandwidth. The consortium behind the Asia-Africa-Europe 1 (AAE-1) cable system has signed up Xtera Communications to supply 200G via Raman amplification and other technologies. AAE-1 will be using the gear on its Egypt, Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore terrestrial legs. When announced two years ago, the project gave a 2016 completion date, but I'm not sure where they are on it thus far.
And those continuing the fight for a new submarine cable between the US and New Zealand suffered yet another setback this week. Talks with Stonepeak International Partners for the NZ$150 million ($98 million) the project needed out of its $500 million price tag have apparently collapsed, according to a news report out of the New Zealand. Tenants Vodafone and Reannnz were already on board, but that last hurdle has been a tough nut to crack. The quest will undoubtedly go on, however.
This article was authored by Rob Powell and was originally posted on Telecomramblings.com
Rob Powell is founder & editor of Telecom Ramblings, which was set up in 2008. The website is dedicated to discussing trends and developments in the telecom industry.