AMX-1 Submarine Cable System Launches for Service

According to Telmex, Telmex and its parent company América Móvil have commercially launched its AMX-1 submarine cable system at its Cancun landing point as of December 17, 2013. The deployment of the cable has taken around 19 months, at an estimated cost of over US$500 million, with ongoing work still to be done in the rest of its Latin American operations. The launch of the AMX-1 submarine cable system will serve to boost América Móvil's already dominant position in the Mexican telecoms market, despite the impending reforms. 

The AMX-1 cable spans 17,500km long (10,875 miles) and connect seven countries with landing points in 11 cities in the Americas region.  The AMX-1 cable with its 100G transmission will provide high-speed connectivity for access to new services, including applications in 4G, TV broadcasts in HD, broadband with ultra high speeds, or enterprise cloud.

Mexico marks the first commercial launch of the AMX-1 cable, and it is still the core business contributor to América Móvil's revenues. The company is under pressure in its domestic market, as reforms look to end the dominance of Telmex in the fixed voice and wireline broadband market, as well as its mobile subsidiary Telcel.

The commercial launch of AMX-1 cable will also serve to strengthen América Móvil's dominance in Mexico, able to offer its larger customer base superior speeds at a lower cost than its rivals, due to lower maintenance costs and wholesale agreements with other players.