The Pacific Ocean might soon have two more submarine cables underneath the waves. On its infrastructure blog yesterday, Facebook announced plans for two systems connecting the US directly with Singapore, with two sets of partners. The cables will add both diversity and capacity to the overall subsea infrastructure between North America and southeast Asia.
The Echo cable system will land in Eureka, California, hook up Guam along the way, and then go on via a southerly route to Singapore and perhaps destinations in Indonesia as well. They are working with Google and Indonesia’s XL Axiata on this project, and the completion date is 2023.
Meanwhile, the BiFrost cable will go in parallel from what appears to be near San Luis Obispo, through Guam again, and on to Singapore via a different, more northerly route. They are working with Indonesia’s Telin and Singapore’s Keppel on BiFrost, with an RFS date of 2024.
The astute will recall that Guam came up just recently in another context: the launch of Turbidite by former Pacnet and Reliance Globalcom CEO Bill Barney. Turbidite’s first move was to announce a JV to build a Tier III+ data center in Guam, a coincidence that isn’t a coincidence of course.
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Categories: Undersea cables
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Great Post. I love this article.