Pan-Arctic Cable System Gains Momentum

The vision of building a subsea cable that leverages shorter routes through the Arctic Ocean to connect Europe, Asia, and North America has been around for a while. Making that vision reality has been elusive, but recent moves suggest it might not be that far off now. A collection of companies and other entities with infrastructure experience in that part of the world have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to explore a Pan-Arctic Cable System (PACS).

The MoU signatories are GlobalConnect AB, Cinia Oy, NORDUnet A/S, Tusass A/S, the Dutch Subsea Cable Coalition, and Tampnet AS. All but one of those are very active players in northern Europe’s subsea cable market. The other, Tusass A/S is a telecommunications provider in Greenland. Notably not on the list yet are infrastructure participants from Russia or North America, but at some point I’m sure that others will have to get involved. The other players that pretty much have to be involved at some point are the hyperscalers, who have driven so much in recent years.

Details of what sort of cable system they are talking about are not yet available, with only continents listed as targets. I’m sure they have some more concrete ideas, but a whole lot of options are surely still on the table. But the timeframe is to have a system fully operational by the ‘early 2030s’. Perhaps they hope by then that the political side of things will, umm, settle down a bit.

If you haven't already, please take our Reader Survey! Just 3 questions to help us better understand who is reading Telecom Ramblings so we can serve you better!

Categories: Undersea cables