Subsea Cables & Internet Infrastructure

Hollow core enjoys 33% lower latency than standard solid core single mode fibre. Moreover, it offers at least 50% more bandwidth because a much wider spectrum band can be used. In contrast, solid glass is hobbled by high attenuation outside the C and L bands. A final advantage is hollow core exhibits little chromatic dispersion. Single mode fibre is bedeviled by polar mode and chromatic dispersion. In each case, the speed of light through glass varies sufficiently by wavelength to blur the signal by the time it reaches the far end. The coherent optics revolution was largely about using digital signal processing to unscramble the signal or more precisely to use physics to work backwards and infer the original, pristine signal. But hollow core technology until now has been stymied by very high optical attenuation. This simply means the light fades rapidly as it passes through the hollow core. The light is absorbed rapidly by the surrounding glass border due to the absence of refraction. ...

Seacom announced today the Son of Seacom cable project. It's very ambitious with the goal of connecting Singapore to Marseille with a branch going down the East Africa Coast and up to Angola. I estimate the cable will land in 20 countries including Singapore, India, Pakistan, Oman, Dubai, Djibouti, Sudan, Egypt, Somalia, Saudi Arabia, Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique, South Africa, and what appears to be Angola, but might be one of the two Congos. The press release claims it will a 48 fibre pair architecture. I am not sure what that means. A 48 fibre pair cable would make Seacom 2.0 one of the most expensive and technically challenging cables ever dropped in the water. In fact, no one has deployed a repeatered 48 subsea cable over long distances I believe the Trans-Atlantic Anjana cable holds the record at 24 fibe pairs and 480 Tbps design capacity. I strongly believe Seacom management will be forced to downsize their ambitions. A much more likely figure will 16 fibre pairs or 24 with ...

 AI Industry Implosion Is Just A Matter Of Time Too much $$$ chasing too few and highly imperfect applications. Yann LeCun is a towering figure in AI research and Facebook's Chief AI researcher. Won the most prestigious award in computer science, namely the 2018 Turning prize. Also researcher at the New York Courant Institute. 

Most West African coast cables land in Portugal. The buyer's challenge is that are few connectivity providers available to carry that traffic to the rest of Europe. Arelion and Zayo are both off-net. My guess is Arelion will light layer 1 services near the end of 2025. What providers are available do not offer a lot of physical diversity as most are using fibre on the high tension power lines.  I came across Lyntia roughly a year ago via an EUNetworks introduction. This wholesale network is the subsidiary of Naturgy, a multinational electricity and gas company. The company is a power and gas provider owning a very dense distribution network in Spain and Portugal.  Lyntia's fibre is in the gas pipeline right of way with a little bit on high tension power lines. The network enjoys unique physical diversity as its Layer 1 competitors have bought IRU's on a rival power line company. Unlike some of its competitors, Lyntia enjoys rock solid financial stability as a subsidiary of ...

A point: FR5; Z point: Any Singapore Equinix facility; 10G; Layer 1; $35,750 MRC; 3 Year. The Middle Eastern and segment is route protected.

Right now there is a swarm of buyers seeking Bifrost and Topaz capacity. A former Google subsea cable guy warned me some time ago that these projects would be a big disappointment to the wholesale community. Google is keeping much of the Topaz spectrum for itself with one major transaction with a government entity. The main providers in the market are MOX and Telstra. I believe each owns a fibre pair with Mox doing a fair amount of spectrum sales in the form of quarter fibre pair sales. To give you a sense of pricing, a 15 year 100G wave pricing between Tokyo Equinix and Seattle Westin Building is slightly over $3 million upfront with 4% O&M. Ignoring discounting, that's $27K a month! 😂 I estimate most 1 year leases will be in the upper $30K to $50K MRC range. The route is extremely sexy because it is the lowest latency stable route between Tokyo and Seattle, lands in Canada, which Canadians love, and is diverse to other Japan/US cables. Of course, the lowest latency cable is ...

Juno 100G Lease; 3 Years; $15,500 MRC; Tokyo Equinix/Coresite 2, LA.  Juno 100G IRU; 15 Years; $875K; 4% O&M; Tokyo Equinix/Coresite 2, LA. Jupiter 100G Lease; 3 Years; $18,250 MRC; Tokyo Equinix/Coresite 2, LA. Jupiter 100G IRU; 15 Years; $875K; 4% O&M; Tokyo Equinix/Coresite 2, LA. SJC2 100G Lease; 1 Year; $12K MRC; Mega-i, HK/SG3 or GS, SG. SJC2 100G Lease; 1 Year; $13K MRC; Chikuri CLS/SG3 or GS. ADC 100G Lease; 1 Year; $13K MRC; Tokyo Equinix/SG1. Remarks: 1. No China licensed carriers. 2. Customer responsible for cross connects. 3. Six to eight weeks is standard turn up.