Thursday Roundup: Southern Cross, VIAVI, Aligned, Comcast

Four other bits of news from around the industry worth catching up on:

The newest subsea cable effort on the long route between North America and Australia has achieved a key milestone. Pacific Carriage Limited says that says that the Southern Cross SX NEXT cable has officially landed at the HMB IX facility at California’s Hermosa Beach. When complete the system will add 72Tbps between the US and Australia/New Zealand with connectivity to other destinations in Oceania.

VIAVI has boosted its unsolicited bid for EXFO by another $0.50/share. They are now offering $8/share, valuing the company at $459M. That offer now stands $2/share higher than the going private transaction the current management has been working on. However, EXFO’s controlling shareholder, Germain Lamonde, has rejected the bid and says he won’t consider any transaction with Viavi. VIAVI is hoping to combine the efforts of two of the industry’s network test, monitoring, and assurance vendors.

Aligned has raised some more money for expansion. The data center developer and operator has increased its senior secured credit facility by 25% to $1.25B. The facility is linked to Aligned’s sustainability initiatives, and the increase reflects the company’s success so far in meeting the goals established for that effort. Aligned has committed to matching 100% of its annual energy consumption to zero-carbon renewable energy by 2024.

And Comcast is expanding its fiber reach into new territory in the Pacific Northwest. They are expanding their service territory into Hubbard and Woodburn, communities along Interstate 5 in the Willamette Valley south of the Portland metro area. The move will take both the company’s consumer internet services and their business connectivity, with construction already underway on the fiber backbone itself. The project is expected to be complete by the end of 2022.

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Categories: Cable · Datacenter · Mergers and Acquisitions · Undersea cables