The New Uniterreno Cable: RFS 2025

This super high capacity half petabit cable connects Genoa, Milano, Roma, Sardinia, and Sicily. It has 24 pairs and total design capacity of 480 Tbps. ASN is the project supplier. The cable is part of a bigger project to build Italian data centers and a complementary terrestrial fibre network. Unidata is the owner; it is constructing a data center near Rome. 

The Sales Pitch

1. Uniterreno is an open cable. Customers can buy fibre pairs and are responsible for most of the terrestrial infrastructure including the SLTEs. The common infrastructure includes the cable itself together with the subsea amplifiers and power feed equipment. Customers are generally responsible for backhaul fibre, terrestrial amplifiers, and their POPs where the SLTEs are housed. The ability to customize the terrestrial network is a big draw.

2. The Sicily to Northern Italy RTD is 9 milliseconds. Significantly better than traveling up Italy's boot.

3. Huge capacity means great pricing (or should). Networks enjoy economies of scale in construction and operating costs. A 24 fibre pair cable might only cost 25% to 50% more than 12 fibre pairs. Costs are strictly concave. A wet segment maintenance contract is only weakly related to the fiber pair count.

It seems highly unlikely that the cable can put a lot of its capacity to work without lowering market prices.

4. Resiliency is a key virtue. Carriers and ISPs can take wet capacity as protect paths for their primary terrestrial links. I expect terrestrial to remain the working paths because they have add-drops between major cities and faster repairs.

5. The Sicily to Genoa and Milano routes have express pairs. So it is possible to own or lease pair without populating the Rome node. That sharply improves the economics. Undoubtedly, the express path will garner some interest.

The Big Question: Sufficient Demand

Uniterreno press releases often invoke the metaphor of the cable system as a digital bridge between Europe and the big intercontinental cable systems. But if a consortium or American Tech Giant desires to build a new cable connecting Europe to India or Singapore, why would it build from Singapore to Sicily and then buy a pair on Uniterreno to reach Genoa or Marseille? Economies of scale mean that a cable will be built end-to-end. So I don't expect other cable systems to buy Uniterreno pairs to extend their footprints. So the success or failure of the cable depends on traffic originating in Marseille, Genoa, Milano, Rome, Sardinia, and Sicily. I do not believe it can tap into or grab some of the intercontinental traffic. Hence I am not confident there is enough 'internal Italian traffic' to fill the pipes in a timely fashion.

RFS: 3Q2025 or 4Q2025

This project is moving fast. Permit applications were filed in 2023. Some of the cable segments should be ready for commercial service this autumn. Uniterreno's management has executed well. I wish them good fortune.

Map of the Fibre Optic Subsea Uniterreno Cable



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