TE SubCom Supplies MAREA Cable System

Facebook, Microsoft, and TE SubCom announced on Oct. 19 that TE SubCom has been named the system supply partner for the new MAREA submarine cable across the Atlantic Ocean, with a scheduled completion date of October 2017

TE SubCom has completed the route survey and begun manufacture of the system at its facility in Newington, New Hampshire. The parties are on track to begin laying cable using TE SubCom's state-of-the-art cable installation ships next year, with a scheduled completion date of October 2017.

As announced by Facebook and Microsoft in May 2016, MAREA will be the highest-capacity subsea cable to ever cross the Atlantic – featuring eight fiber-pairs and an initial estimated design capacity of 160 Terabits/sec. The new 6,600 km submarine cable system will also be the first to connect the United States to southern Europe: from Virginia Beach, Virginia to Bilbao, Spain. This new southern route will provide greater diversity of connections and enhanced reliability for customers, as well as optimal connectivity to data centers on the East Coast of the United States.

Led by Facebook and Microsoft, TE SubCom is constructing MAREA to be interoperable with a wide variety of network equipment. This new "open" design brings significant benefits for customers: lower costs and easier equipment upgrades, which lead to faster growth in the speed of communications for users since the system can evolve at the pace of optical technology innovation.

Source: TE SubCom