SEARCH


Julian Rawle Consulting
Julian Rawle Consulting
  • Welcome
  • About
  • Services
  • Consulting
  • Commentary
  • Collaborating Professionals
  • Resources
  • Contact

Commentary

Trans-Tasman Submarine Cable Goes Live

7/11/2017

0 Comments

 
A 2,288 km fiber optic cable between New Zealand and Australia is officially in service.

The $100 million Tasman Global Access cable runs from Ngarunui Beach in Raglan to Narrabeen Beach in Sydney and will carry vast quantities of internet traffic between the two countries.

Figure 7 - TGA Cable Map
Picture
Source: Telstra

The project is a joint venture between Spark, Vodafone and Telstra, which want to strengthen diversity and resiliency within the country's telecommunications infrastructure.

The cable has been constructed to deliver more international bandwidth and capacity for New Zealand and also serves as a digital link to fast-growing Asian economic markets by enabling better connectivity to the five major international cable systems currently serving Australia.

Spark, Vodafone and Telstra all expressed their pleasure with the project's successful completion.

Communications Minister Simon Bridges said the cable provided greater capacity in the system, reducing the risk of bottlenecks and enabling faster, better internet for consumers, particularly when content is being streamed from overseas. It also provided greater competition in New Zealand's cable market.

"This cable is another step towards ensuring we've got affordable and robust connections with the rest of the world. It also ensures that domestic demands for data are supported by international capacity, setting us up for the future," he said.

​The cable is comprised of two fiber pairs, has a total design capacity of 20 terabits per second and has 20 repeaters which are used to amplify the optical signals along the length of the cable.
It was laid by the Alcatel Submarine Networks "Ile de Ré" cable-laying ship.

Source: New Zealand Herald

ANALYSIS: It has taken more than four years for three major telcos, with a vast amount of experience in building submarine fiber optic cables, to construct this relatively simple point-to-point system between New Zealand and Australia.

The tender for turnkey supply of the system was issued in June 2013 and awarded to Alcatel Submarine Networks (now Nokia ASN) in December 2014 but four months earlier, it was announced that Telstra had pulled out of the partnership. Clearly, Telstra was eventually persuaded to return to the fold but construction work on the project did not commence until March 2016.

It is highly likely that Telstra's skittishness was related to the interest that Spark NZ (formerly the incumbent, Telecom New Zealand) has in the Tasman Global Access cable and the Southern Cross cable system.

Southern Cross has operated a virtual monopoly on transpacific connectivity from New Zealand since 2000. With a figure-of-eight design, Southern Cross successfully argued for many years that it could provide all the resiliency that New Zealand needed. Furthermore, the Management were careful to benchmark their pricing of international bandwidth against trends in Australia and, when any new competing cable was proposed, they cut their prices to undermine the new cable's business case.

Given that New Zealand is a relatively small market, Vodafone and Telstra could not justify another transpacific cable and chose instead to build across the Tasman Sea to connect to the submarine cable hub in Sydney, Australia. However, for reasons unknown, there was a delay in putting the contract with ASN into force.

Southern Cross' reaction to Tasman Global Access has been to announce a new lowest latency transpacific cable called "NEXT" which will connect Clovelly, NSW, Australia; Whenuapai, Auckland, New Zealand; and Los Angeles, CA, USA. Priced at US$350M, this cable is planned to be ready for service in 2019. NEXT is a direct challenge to Tasman Global Access which will not be able to compete for transpacific business on latency.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Julian Rawle, Author

    Thought leadership articles and commentary on developments related to the subsea fibre optic cable industry can be found here.

    MarineTraffic AIS Ship Data & Live Map Positions

    INDUSTRY PULSE: Retelit Trades AAE-1 Capacity for Asian Services… SEAIOCMA Extends Cable Maintenance Contract with Global Marine… Djibouti Africa Regional Express (DARE) Submarine Cable System Contract in Force... Tui-Samoa Submarine Cable System Final Splice Completed... Xtera Initiates Legal Action against Nokia and NEC for Alleged Patent Infringement... Basslink Subsea Cable Outage Caused By Exceeding Design Limit: Experts... ANTONIO MEUCCI arrived at port CATANIA... ASEAN EXPLORER departed from port SEMBAWANG... ASEAN RESTORER departed from port SEMBAWANG... BOLD MAVERICK departed from port SINGAPORE... CABLE INNOVATOR departed from port VICTORIA... CABLE RETRIEVER departed from port SUBIC BAY ... DECISIVE arrived at port LAS PALMAS... DEPENDABLE departed from port CAPE TOWN... DURABLE arrived at port JINGJIANG... CS ETISALAT departed from port HAMRIYA... FJORDKABEL arrived at port HARSTAD... FU AN arrived at port MINHANG... FU HAI departed from port KITAKYUSHU... GLOBAL SENTINEL departed from port HONOLULU, HI... ILE DAIX departed from port PALMONES... ILE DE BATZ arrived at port CALAIS... ILE DE BREHAT departed from port RIO DE JANEIRO... ILE DE RE departed from port SUVA... ILE DE SEIN departed from port NORFOLK, VA... IT INTREPID departed from port CAPE CANAVERAL, FL... KDDI OCEAN LINK departed from port YOKOHAMA... KDDI PACIFIC LINK arrived at port MOJI... KIZUNA arrived at port NAHA... LEON THEVENIN departed from port CAPE TOWN... CS LIMIN VENTURE departed from port BATU AMPAR... LODBROG departed from port KEELUNG... MAERSK RESPONDER departed from port PASIR GUDANG... MARAM departed from port FREE PORT... NIWA arrived at port SALALAH... NORDKABEL arrived at port BOKN... PACIFIC GUARDIAN arrived at port WILLEMSTAD... PETER FABER arrived at port MINDELO... PIERRE DE FERMAT arrived at port HOEK VAN HOLLAND... RAYMOND CROZE departed from port CATANIA... CS RECORDER arrived at port BLYTH... RELIANCE arrived at port NOUMEA... RENE DESCARTES departed from port LUANDA... RESOLUTE arrived at port KEELUNG... RESPONDER departed from port AUCKLAND... SEGERO departed from port SHANTOU... SOVEREIGN arrived at port PORTLAND, UK... SUBARU departed from port NAGASAKI... TELIRI departed from port CAPE TOWN... TENEO arrived at port WILLEMSTAD... UMM AL ANBER departed from port HAMRIYA... VEGA departed from port BATANGAS BAY... WAVE SENTINEL arrived at port WILLEMSTAD...
    Picture
    Julian Rawle participated in the Submarine Networks World Conference 8-10 September 2015 in Singapore

    Archives

    February 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Tweets by @JulianRawle





​​+1 617.417.6321

j.rawle@consultingjulian.com

BACK TO TOP

© 2015 Julian Rawle Consulting  |  All Rights Reserved  |  Website Created by LislDesign.com

Julian Rawle Consulting