New Subsea Cables RFS 2025: Echo
Transmission Technology: Spatial Division Multiplexing. Length: 16,026 kilometers. Almost 10,000 US miles. Consortium Members: Google and Facebook. Type of Consortium: Open cable model. Construction Status: Behind schedule due to permitting delays for Indonesian waters. Fifty-fifty control probably also slowed decision making. Number of Fibre Pairs: Main trunk has 12. Estimated RFS: 1st or 2nd quarter 2025. Day One Aggregate Throughput: 144 Tbps. Salient Features: First low latency, direct cable between Singapore and USA with no intermediate breakouts. One Indonesian branching unit. No telecom carrier consortium members. Amazon and Facebook land the cable themselves in Singapore and California. Google announced announced the 12 fibre pair SDM Echo project in early 2021 with a planned 2023 launch. However, permitting delays have slowed construction and the project is now expected to be RFS 2025. In addition, it is highly plausible that the 50-50 Facebook/Google control split sl