Capacity Watch

According to Reuters, Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE: ALU) has planned to pursue an initial public offering of shares for its submarine cable business in the first half of 2015, ending a string of rumors about the future of the division that's been suffering from weakening demand.

The magic power of 2014 seems a double-dealer on the submarine cable industry. It endowed the industry with an investment peak, secured funding for new cables with significant importance around the globe, across the Pacific, connecting Asia, Africa and Europe, linking Brazil to the US, Africa and Europe. On the other hand, it resulted in a disaster which is even worse than the one caused by the Japan Earthquake and Tsunami in 2011. Here come the top stories of 2014.

According to The Sydney Morning Herald news, Telstra will acquire Asian-based telecommunications provider Pacnet for US$697 million (AU$857 million). The deal includes Pacnet's data centres throughout the region, including China, the EAC-C2C undersea cable system, the EAC-Pacific undersea cable system (which consists of two dedicated fiber pairs of the Unity undersea cable system). And Pacnet's IP VPN and data centre services in China would be of particular interest to Telstra. The deal is subject to regulatory approval and is expected to be completed by mid-2015.

KVH has announced the offering of 10G and 100G Japan Backhaul Service solutions that connect the Shima Cable Landing Station, the Chikura Cable Landing Station and the Toyohashi Cable Landing Station with central Tokyo and Osaka through KVH’s Ethernet backbone network. All the services are available as of Dec. 2014.

According to Chinese news, China Unicom, the nation’s second largest mobile and fixed network operator, launched on Friday the China-Myanmar International (CMI) terrestrial cable system. The CMI terrestrial cable spans 1500 km from Ruili in the southwest China to Ngwe Saung Beach in the Irrawaddy Delta of Myanmar. A launching ceremony was held at the same time in Nanning, the capital city of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in China, and Naypyidaw, the capital of Myanmar, with a live HD Video Conference running over the CMI cable system.

Huawei Marine Networks Co. Ltd. (Huawei Marine) announced on Thursday that it has commenced manufacturing the cable for the 1,900km Far East submarine cable system across the Sea of Okhotsk and will also shortly start manufacturing other wet plant for this system. Huawei Marine and Rostelecom signed the turnkey system design and development contract for the Far East submarine cable system in June 2014.

According to the FCC notice on September 18, 2014, China Mobile (USA) Inc. has retained new counsel in its FCC 214 international license application proceeding. China Mobile (USA) filed for the FCC 214 international license on September 1, 2011 with reference number ITC-214-20110901-00289. Due to fears of spying, China Mobile’s FCC 214 license application has been pending by the FCC and Team Telecom for more than 3 years.

According to Capacity, China Telecom has expanded its network coverage in Europe through a new PoP in Telecity’s AMS 5 data centre in Amsterdam. According to China Telecom Global, China Telecom has established overseas subsidiaries or representative offices in 25 countries and regions, operates an extensive global network covering more than 40 overseas PoPs via high-speed terrestrial cables and submarine cables, with a total international transmission capacity of approximately 8000Gbps and international internet connection bandwidth of more than 2400Gbps.

Signs of change

In the last few weeks there have been some signs that the carrier world is likely to face its biggest change and shake up since the era of deregulation.

Postings from a high ranking Telia Sonera executive and news about Face books intentions underline that change is already here.

In a recent post Neil Tagare, who is never shy of writing what many do not want to hear, wrote on his blog that carriers should be very scared at the Facebook /WhatsApp news because it has the potential to shift a huge number of revenue generating communications off of carrier networks and onto the face book network.

DALLAS, TEXAS, USA – (February 26, 2014) – Xtera Communications, Inc., a leading global provider of optical networking solutions, will be present at OFC 2014 with a live 100G unrepeatered transmission demonstration over 500km fiber length on the exhibit floor, two papers, and participation in a 100G workshop. OFC 2014 is the world's leading event for advancing optical solutions and will be held on 9-13 March 2014 in San Francisco, California, USA.

According to Reuters, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff  promoted and confirmed on the EU-Brazil Summit 2014 on Monday to lay an undersea communications cable from Lisbon to Fortaleza to reduce Brazil's reliance on the United States after Washington spied on Brasilia. And Brazil and the European Union have agreed the $185 million Brazil-Europe submarine cable project. Earlier this month, Telebras unveiled the plan to form a joint venture with Spain's IslaLink Submarine Cables to lay and operate a Brazil-Europe submarine cable.

Source: China Daily, Feb. 21, 2014  By Shen Jingting

China Telecom Corp Ltd, the largest fixed-line service and the third-biggest mobile network operator in China, aims to become a world leader in integrated information services by 2016.

As an increasing number of Chinese enterprises expand overseas, China Telecom hopes to play an active role in supporting them with seamless global information services, Deng Xiaofeng, chief executive officer of China Telecom Global Ltd, told a news conference in Beijing on Thursday.

According to FOX NEWS, Brazilian state-owned telecom provider Telebras announced on February 12 plans to form a joint venture with Spain's IslaLink Submarine Cables to lay and operate a Brazil-Europe submarine cable. The Brazil-Europe submarine cable project is expected to cost $185 million and be completed in 2016.

No doubt, Chinese are now leading the submarine cable industry. Chinese chair in several important  submarine cable systems across the Pacific or connecting Asia, Africa and Europe, including APG, AAE-1, SMW5, NCP, Faster Cable, no matter under constructing or in planning. There are skeptical and anxious voices, some even think it as a threat. With my perspective and research, I consider it as a natural achievement of the development of the submarine cable industry, natural power of economy, natural power of market.

Vietnam Internet restored to normal after the AAG cable repaired on January 6. The latest AAG cable outage occurred off Vietnam coast near the Vung Tau Cable Landing Station on Dec 20, 2013 and some 60 percent of the Vietnam Internet traffic, according to FPT Telecom. There was moderate saying that the AAG cable outage affected only about 40 percent of Vietnam's international Internet traffic. Anyway, Vietnam Internet was disrupted by the AAG cable outage.

Today, the first working day in 2014, it is a wonderful day. The professional Linkedin group on submarine cable industry, 01 The Submarine Cable Systems group, reached 20,000 members, the default maximum size of a given Linkedin Group. Cheer, we all contribute to the 20000-member group, 01 The Submarine Cable Systems group, the best social networking for professionals in submarine cable industry worldwide.