Subsea Cables & Internet Infrastructure

AAE1; $21.5K MRC; Two Year Term. Peace; $17.5K MRC; One Year Term. A points: MRS2. Z points: SG1/SG3. Customer responsible for cross connects.

 ***100G; SMW5; Marseille/Singapore; $32.5K; 3 Year Term. ***100G; AAE1; Marseille/Singapore; $28.5K; 3 Year Term. Take It Or Leave It Offers. Don't even think of trying to negotiate. It's not that kind of market and you know it. 🙂

***Senegal is the one of the most challenging on-net 2Africa countries. 1. Sonatel appears to have a monopoly on Dakar metro fibre. This spells trouble. 2. Sonatel's landline infrastructure monopoly may be one reason many 2Africa consortium members declined capacity into Senegal, despite its strategic location as the natural Northwest Africa telecom hub. Another reason might be their lack of mobile operations in that country as Senegal is a small market. 3. ONIX data center is the place to be in Senegal. Carrier neutral and on-net for 2Africa. Most African ISPs coming to me for advice plan to make ONIX their home. 4. I expect 100G pricing to be high due to the dearth of capacity. Figure low 30s for 100Gs to Europe and upper 20s for 100Gs to West African countries. ***Ghana is much friendlier. Many 2Africa carriers are on-net at the CLS and also the very popular PAIX data center. In fact, I know one that has built a ring from the CLS to PAIX reflecting strong demand for the latter. ...

 1. APG Cable; 100G; Hong Kong/Singapore; $8500 MRC; 1 Year. 2. ADC; 100G; Tokyo/Singapore; $13,850 MRC; 1 Year. 3. ASE; 100G; Tokyo/Singapore; $18,000 MRC; 1 Year. 4. ASE; 100G; HK/Tokyo; $8,500 MRC; 1 Year. 5. ASE; 100G; HK/Singapore; $5500 MRC; 1 Year Remarks: Customers responsible for cross connects. Pricing is the same whether from CLS to CLS or carrier neutral POP to carrier neutral POP.

Mombasa/Dar es Salaam; $15,100; 1 Year; 2Africa. Mombasa/Djibouti; $15,100; 1 Year; 2Africa. Mombasa/Amanzimtoti; $18,100; 1 Year; 2Africa. Capetown/Amanzimtoti; $10,900; 1 Year; 2Africa.

There is strong demand for wavelengths connecting Europe's key routes like London/Paris, Amsterdam/London, Amsterdam/Frankfurt, Frankfurt/Paris, Paris/Marseille, Zurich/Frankfurt, Milano/Marseille, Madrid/Paris, Madrid/Lisbon, etc. Much of this involves African ISPs that come to Europe to peer and buy transit as well as Indian and Asian firms.  But Europe is different. A 100G wavelength varies from the mid to upper 800 Euros per month to the mid 1500 Euros depending on term, route, physical diversity, latency, etc. Because rates are low focusing on price is a mistake. Don't be transactional like a certain American President. You will save little because prices are already low, but sacrifice a lot in terms of latency, time waiting for price quotes, delivery, uptime, routing options and commercial flexibility. For example, my favorite provider has fast routes for general bandwidth users that are usually 1 to 4 milliseconds lower latency than the rest of the pack. So you can save ...

The beauty of publicly traded telecom infrastructure companies is that they cannot shroud their business in secrecy. Below is a very high level breakdown of Equinix revenues over the last several years. In 2023 the company got $1.9 billion from interconnection, which is its euphemism for cross connects. It comprised 19.4% of 2023 revenues. I must confess I am bit puzzled by how slowly the cross connect revenues are growing because Equinix offers no volume discounts (in Europe even big long haul carriers get only a few Euros off) to anybody. Moreover, Equinix is indispensable in many cities like Zurich, London (Slough, UK), and Amsterdam (AM5 is the best single peering point in the city). A 3Q2024 investor presentation says the company has 478,000 total interconnections. Let's assume each is a cross connect. That implies $3,974 USD per year or $331 per month, which seems too low. I invite readers to comment if they have an idea of what explains the discrepancy between the standard $...

Lisbon/Lagos; 100G; Equiano; $19K; 2 years. Mumbai//Singapore; 100G; $20K; 3 years. Coresite 1Wilshire/NY4; 100G; $3900; 3 years. Dallas Equinix/Ashburn Equinix; 100G; $2200; 3 years. Singapore Equinix/Tokyo Equinix; 100G; $15000; 3 years. Nikhef/AM5; Linear Dark Fibre Pair; 350 Euros; 3 years. Milan/Athens; 100G; $6500; 3 years. NY4/SP4; 100G; $8500; 3 years. Ashburn Equinix/Telehouse 2; 100G; Dunant; $5800; 3 years.

With the exception of 2Africa, which has two landings one of which is 500 kilometers South of Lagos, all Nigerian landings are along a 25 kilometer wide beach in an area called Lekki. I expect 2Africa and Equiano to dominate the transport market going forward with 2Africa finally live in February or early March. At that point I expect combined capacity of these two modern cables to push prices into the teens for 100G waves. The older subsea cables like WACS, ACE, MainOne, SAT3, and GLO-1 will struggle to compete because their per bit costs are much higher. These older cables have far less capacity, but similar operating expenses similar to 2Africa or Equiano. For example, the older cables probably pay as much if not more for maintenance given their higher fault frequency. They are more likely to experience outages due to shallower burial and riskier routing through the blue ocean than either Equiano or 2Africa. Inferior service, higher costs. Not a recipe for success.  Unlike thei...

London, Paris, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Zurich, Marseille, Madrid, Munich, Vienna, and many more are Layer 1 400G wave ready. Standard three year pricing is under 3000€ per month plus at least 1200 Euros a month in cross connect savings over buying 4x 100Gs. Many routes have been completely redone including conduit and ILAs with new ultra-low loss fibre and unique city approaches. 

LS1/Capetown CT1; 10G; Equiano; $6500 MRC.  Marseille/Singapore; Peace; $20K per month; 1 year.  Marseille/Singapore; AAE1; $24K a month; 2 year.  Singapore/Tokyo; ADC; $15K on a 3 year.  Mombasa/Marseille; $45K MRC; 1 year.  10x or more 100G European waves; 925€ per wave; 3 years.  Lagos/LS1; $20K; 2 years.  NY4 Secaucus Equinix/Ashburn Equinix; $1300; 3 years.  Ashburn Equinix/Telehouse 2 Paris; Dunant; $5250; 3 year.  Dallas Equinix/Ashburn Equinix; $2400; 3 year. 

The wholesale telecom community eagerly anticipates the lighting of the ADC system. This 8 fibre pair cable has an intitial design capacity of 180 Tbps. It will serve China, Japan, Singapore, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam. NEC is building the cable. Consortium members include China Unicom, China Telecom, Singtel, Softbank, Tata, and one of the two Vietnam operator incumbents.  My sources tell me the current RFS estimate is January, 2025.  Good Singapore/Tokyo pricing available. Figure as low as $15K per monthon long term contracts.  SJC and SJC2 are relatively good complements as they do not share cable landing stations with ADC.  HK-SG 35.5 ms RTD. SG-TOKYO 66.5 ms RTD.  TOKYO-HK 44.5 ms RTD.  Singapore Landing Station: Tuas. Tokyo Landing Station: Maruyama. 

Equiano is a Google cable. A 12 fibre pair spatial division multiplexing system designed to do at least 12 Tbps per pair. This cable is a must-have for African ISPs as it connects the three key telecom hubs of Portugal (Lisbon Equinix (LS1)), Nigeria (the Open Access Data Center (OADC) in Lagos), and South Africa (Capetown Teraco (CT1) in South Africa), has massive capacity and is vastly more reliable than older African cables.  Equiano not only connects the key telecom hubs essential to West Africa's Internet, but is also buried two meters deep and avoids the dangerous undersea areas like the Congo canyon and Le Trou Sans Fin that have caused many subsea outages. Le Trou experienced a debris slide this Spring that caused 4 African cables (SAT3, Mainone, WACS, and ACE) to be severed in the Ivory Coast's territorial waters. Equiano saved West Africa's Internet from a complete subsequent meltdown as its capacity was used to reroute traffic to Lisbon or South Africa. Equiano...

Marseille/Singapore; AAE1 cable; 10G wavelength; $3,200 MRC; 2 year term.  London/Singapore Overland; SG/HK/China/Kazakhstan/Bellarus/Poland/Germany/London;  full GigE; $8,000 MRC; 185 ms RTD.  LD4 Equinix/AM5 Amsterdam; Scylla Cable; 100G Wave; 1,100€ MRC; low latency path; 3 year term.  Milano/Palermo; 100G Wave; 2,000€ MRC; 3 year term.  Lisbon Equinix/Capetown Teraco; Equiano Cable; 100G Wave; $32K MRC; 3 years.  CLS Japan/CLS Oregon; Faster Cable; 100G Wave; $13,500 MRC; 1 year term.  Ashburn Equinix/Telehouse 2 Paris; 100G Wave; Dunant Cable; $5750 MRC; 3 year term.  Dallas Equinix/Ashburn Equinix; 100G Wave; $2,400 MRC; 3 year term.  Ashburn Equinix/Secaucus Equinix; 100G Wave; $1,900 MRC; 3 year term.  Ashburn Equinix/San Jose Equinix; 100G Wave; $2,950 MRC; 3 year term.  Ashburn Equinix/Miami M1 Equinix; 100G Wave; $1,950 MRC; 3 year term.  Secaucus Equinix/Coresite LA2; 100G Wave; $3,950; 3 year term. 

If you can take it at the Chikura and Bandon CLS, MRC is $13.5K per 100G. From TY4 to 1 Wilshire pricing is $17.5K MRC. Good deal.