APCN 2 Submarine Cable System Ready for Services

December 20, 2001 - A consortium of leading telecommunication companies today launched services on Asia Pacific Cable Network 2 (APCN 2), the first pan Asian submarine ring system.

The APCN 2 submarine cable system comprises 19,000 km of cable, connecting China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Taiwan, using the most advanced fibre optic technology deploying state-of-the-art Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) technology to ensure an eventual design capacity of 2.56 T/bits.

The major investors in the APCN 2 submarine cable system include Cable & Wireless, China Telecom, China Unicom, Chunghwa Telecom, Concert, Global One, Japan Telecom, KDDI, KT, KPN, Metromedia Fiber Network Services, NTT Com, NCIC, PLDT, Reach, Starhub, SingTel, Taiwan Fixed Network, Teleglobe, Telekom Malaysia and Williams Communications.

In addition to providing Intra Asian connectivity, APCN 2 will also provide seamless interconnection with other major Trans-Pacific cable networks which provide connectivity to the USA.

The APCN-2 Consortium members have invested over US$ 1 billion in the project, including US$800 million supply contract awarded to NEC Corporation.

APCN 2 is a fully diverse cable system, which will provide cost effective services to multinational customers across the region. It is designed as a self-healing network which means that customers' services can be protected by using alternative paths or routing, when required.

The APCN 2 submarine cable system initially offers 80 Gbit/s of capacity, which will be up-graded to 160 Gbit/s in 2002 to meet the burgeoning demand for bandwidth in the region. Further upgrades to the full design capacity will be implemented in accordance with demand.