Issue 42 - Submarine Telecoms Forum

Transcription

Pacific Outlook Issue
Issue 42, January 2009
#42
Pacific
Outlook
Issue
An international forum for the expression of ideas and opinions pertaining to the submarine telecoms industry
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Welcome
to the 42nd
issue of Submarine Telecoms Forum
magazine, our Pacific Outlook
edition.
2
2009 promises to be an exciting year…
To say it has been an interesting few
months would be ludicrous; it has
been far more than that. But what I
find interesting is trying to discern
what is happening in the markets,
and where and how fast things are
headed. To listen to the “experts”
and politicians is equally dismaying
because many are simply speculating
beyond their comfort zone. So what
I have learned to do is listen anew to
the Depression era generation as they
have lessons to share, and their words
are succinct and ring true - this, too,
shall pass.
With this in mind, we have some
excellent articles to start this new
year.
Paul Budde and Kylie Wansink
provide their interesting vantage on
the Asia Pacific region, while Roland
Lim highlights recent industry
collaborative strategies.
Anne
LeBoutillier introduces a new industry
subsea conference, as Graham Evans
shows some encouraging Pacific
market signs ahead. Chris Barnes,
Steve Lentz and Peter Phibbs update
the NEPTUNE Canada underwater
observatory, and Peter Evans
spotlights developments in the Asia
Pacific region. Brett O’Riley puts his
own spin on times ahead, while Paula
Dobbyn discusses a new Oregon cable
landing station. Jean Devos returns
with his ever insightful observations,
and of course, our ever popular,
“where in the world are all those
pesky cableships” is included as well.
To the new year, with all its new
possibilities, and as always, save me
a seat at the Mai Tai Bar.
#42
Pacific
Outlook
Issue
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24
Global Marine Systems
35
12
5
40
18
ICPC
Nexans
OFS
STF Advertising
Subsea Communications
Conference 2009
4
5
News Now
25
The NEPTUNE Canada Cabled
Ocean Observatory System
10
The New Submarine Paradigm
Paul Budde and Kylie Wansink
27
13
Collaboration The Catalyst For
Growth Roland Lim
NEPTUNE Canada Update
Chris Barnes, Steve Lentz, and Peter
Phibbs
16
Introducing Subsea
Communications! Anne LeBoutillier
19
3
The Future’s Bright, the
Future’s……. In Asia and the
Pacific Graham Evans
29
Spotlight on Asia Pacific
Peter Evans
32
Pacific Outlook Brett O’Riley
36
Florence By The Sea Paula Dobbyn
WFNS
41
The Cableships
46
Letter to a Friend Jean Devos
47
Upcoming Conferences
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wfnstrategies.com
Engineering of submarine and terrestrial optical cable, microwave/WiMax,
mobile, satellite and RF systems for telecom, oil & gas and government clients
A synopsis of current news items from NewsNow, the weekly news feed available on the Submarine Telecoms Forum website.
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World’s first integrated satellite-terrestrial
network delivering mobile video with
interactive services showcased at
International Consumer Electronics Show
(January 7th, 2009)
ICO Global Communications (Holdings) Limited
(NASDAQ: ICOG) and Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext
Paris and NYSE: ALU) will be demonstrating the
world’s first fully integrated satellite-terrestrial
network being used to deliver mobile video and
interactive two-way communications services
during the International [Read more]
Alcatel-Lucent successfully deploys a 3G+
network for SRR in Réunion
(January 7th, 2009)
Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU)
announced today it has successfully deployed
a 3G+ network for the mobile operator SRR.
The first phase of this UMTS/HSPA wireless
network deployment was made in 2008 mostly
in Réunion’s Saint-Denis commune and in the
island’s main towns. Alcatel-Lucent’s UMTS
Radio Access [Read more]
SubTel Forum To Exhibit at PTC ‘09
(January 6th, 2009)
As SubOptic 2010 Media Partner and Programme
Committee Member, WFN Strategies’ SubTel
Forum is pleased to announce its exhibiting at
Pacific Telecommunications Conference 2009
on 18-21 January at Hilton Hawaiian Village in
Honolulu, Hawaii USA. Come and hear Keith
Schofield, Chairman of the [Read more]
Faroese Telecom Is Bringing Capacity to BP’s
Assets Clair and Schiehallion
(December 18th, 2008)
Faroese Telecom and BP have signed a long
term contract whereby Faroese Telecom
provides capacity between the Clair and
Schiehallion installations West of Shetland
and BP’s North Sea headquarters in Aberdeen
via the SHEFA-2 and FarIce submarine cable
systems. Faroese Telecom has [Read more]
AT&T Opens First Data Centre in India
AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) today announced that it has
opened its first data centre in Bangalore, India.
The new data centre will help meet the growing
demand from multinational customers in India
for online data centres with highly resilient
facilities, a wide range of IT [Read more]
Global Crossing Reports GCUK’s Third Quarter
2008 Results (December 11th, 2008)
Global Crossing (NASDAQ:GLBC) , a leading
global IP solutions provider, today announced
third quarter financial results for its subsidiary,
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Global Crossing (UK) Telecommunications
Limited (GCUK). Highlights GCUK generated
82 million pounds in revenue in the third quarter,
with adjusted gross margin of 68 percent or 56
million pounds [Read more]
Michael Boustridge to lead BT Asia Pacific
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BT today announced that BT Americas CEO
Michael Boustridge is to also lead BT’s Asia
Pacific operations. These span 16 countries with
over 4,000 direct staff. Michael succeeds Allen
Ma who retires on 5 January 2009, after four
years leading BT Asia Pacific’s operations. Asia
Pacific and North America represent important
growth [Read more]
BT works with Cabinet Office to address
emergency planning (December 11th, 2008)
BT today announced that it has been awarded
a contract by the UK Cabinet Office Civil
Contingencies Secretariat, and Communities
and Local Government to develop a national
extranet to help government, local authorities
and emergency services respond to civil
emergencies, such as floods and outbreaks of
agricultural diseases. The National Resilience
Extranet (NRE) [Read more]
6
Chunghwa Telecom and Alcatel-Lucent to
deploy Taiwan’s first femtocell network to
improve mobile network coverage in homes
and offices (December 11th, 2008)
today announced that it has been awarded
a Femtocell bid from Chunghwa Telecom,
Taiwan’s largest telecommunications provider,
to deploy Taiwan’s first femtocell network, which
will enhance the coverage [Read more]
LGS Software Solutions Team Designs Custom
Viewer that Improves Management of Military
Digital Engineering Data
LGS, a subsidiary of Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:
ALU) dedicated to serving the U.S. government
community, announced today that the Navy
Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI) has successfully
deployed a custom-designed LGS desktop
application for 230,000 users. The LGS
application, called the LT Viewer, [Read more]
AT&T Announces Expanded Availability of
Global Virtual Private Local Area Network
Service into 14 Countries in Europe and Asia
Pac (December 9th, 2008)
AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) today announced expanded
global reach for AT&T’s Ethernet portfolio with
the immediate availability of a virtual private
local area network service (VPLS) in 14
countries across Europe and Asia Pac. AT&T’s
VPLS service, called OPT-E-WANSM, enables
businesses to link multiple locations - whether
across the city or around the [Read more]
Etisalat, France Telecom Formalize Agreement
Following a Memorandum of Understanding
(MoU) signed on 2 July 2008, Etisalat and
France Telecom announced yesterday that they
had signed a cooperation agreement covering
Digital Home services, content, submarine
cable networks and enterprise solutions. The
companies said that they agree to target future
projects together involving new submarine
cables, in particular [Read more]
The Voyage that Changed the World
The International Cable Protection Committee
has issued the following press release to note
the upcoming 20th anniversary of the first
transatlantic fiber optic cable. On December
14, 1988, the first fibre-optic cable to cross an
ocean came into service. This was a momentous
event because the new technology opened the
door to [Read more]
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GO Cable Installation Begins
GO’s Malta-Italy Cable Construction to Begin
(December 1st, 2008)
Work to lay a second submarine link between
Malta and Sicily has started in St. Paul’s
Bay, Malta, a few days behind schedule
brought about by strong gale force winds last
week. GO, Malta’s quad-play communications
provider, which owns the submarine link, said
the work commenced after the cable ship Teliri,
commissioned [Read more]
Cable-laying works on the second submarine
link to Sicily owned by Malta’s quad-play
communications provider GO has started at
St Paul’s Bay as the Italian vessel carrying out
these works arrived in Malta last week. The
process of laying the cable between St Paul’s
Bay and Mazara Del Vallo, south [Read more]
The Voyage that Changed the World
(December 2nd, 2008)
On December 14, 1988 the first fibre-optic cable
to cross an ocean came into service. This was a
momentous event because the new technology
opened the door to low cost transmission of
electronic data between continents. The timing
was perfect: it coincided with the development
of the Internet and together these [Read more]
New Deep-Sea Observatory Goes Live
7
Off the coast of Central California, in the inky
darkness of the deep sea, a bright orange
metal pyramid about the size of two compact
cars sits quietly on the seafloor. Nestled within
the metal pyramid is the heart of the Monterey
Accelerated Research System [Read more]
Elster Group chooses BT for global IT and
communication services
BT Germany and Elster Group signed a
substantial, 8-year outsourcing contract for
international IT and communications. Under the
terms of the agreement, BT will provide data
centres, the wide-area data network (WAN),
desktop support, user help desk and a variety
of IT services across 38 countries. The BT HP
Alliance plays a [Read more]
BT wins global Green Award
BT has been named winner of the ‘Green Award’
at this year’s World Communication Awards
(WCA) in London. The ‘Green Award’ is a new
addition to the high profile prizes awarded by the
WCA, and aims to reward companies making
significant progress in tackling Corporate Social
& Environmental Responsibility issues. The
World Communication Awards [Read more]
Estonia’s Elion Enterprises teams with AlcatelLucent to simplify management of triple-play
services (November 25th, 2008)
today announced that it is teaming with Elion
Enterprises Ltd., the largest telecommunications
provider in Estonia, to offer a dramatically
improved triple play (voice, data and video)
experience to Elion’s customers. Alcatel-Lucent
will deploy its home network management
solution, providing streamlined [Read more]
Alcatel-Lucent and The Ministry of Higher
Education Training and Scientific Research
of the Kingdom of Morocco through their
partnership make collaboration platforms
available to Moroccan universities
(November 25th, 2008)
Rabat, Morocco and Paris, France, November
24, 2008 - The Ministry of National Education,
Higher Education, Executives training and
Scientific Research of Morocco (MENESFCRS)
and Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris et NYSE:
ALU) today announce the signature of a
cooperation agreement for a new educational
program entitled “Dynamic Knowledge for
Education.” Promoting [Read more]
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Arbinet Launches New Hong Kong IP Exchange
(November 23rd, 2008)
Arbinet-thexchange, Inc. has announced that
it has expanded its IP services with a new
Hong Kong IP Exchange. Arbinet’s Hong Kong
location is operational and ready to connect
ISP sellers and buyers, the company said in a
statement. Located at the MEGA-i Data Center,
Arbinet’s new exchange provides customers in
Asia with [Read more]
SEACOM Wins Awards
On the heels of the recently announced
groundbreaking of the project’s cable landing
stations sites in Mozambique and Kenya, the
SEACOM undersea cable project was the
recipient of three awards at Monday night’s
2008 Africa Investor Infrastructure Awards event
held in Johannesburg, South Africa. SEACOM,
its financier, Nedbank Capital and [Read more]
AT&T Announces First Super Internet Data
Centre in Asia (November 23rd, 2008)
8
AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) today announced it is
opening the first super Internet Data Centre
(IDC) in Asia, located in Singapore. The super
IDC, an expansion of AT&T’s existing facilities,
will act as a regional gateway to the Internet
and the AT&T network to deliver AT&T Synaptic
HostingSM, its next-generation [Read more]
New science and congress center in
Darmstadt, Germany to use Alcatel-Lucent’s
voice and data solution delivered by T-Systems
Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE:
ALU) and its Alliance partner, T-Systems, have
equipped the science and congress center in
Darmstadt, Germany, with a complete endto-end business communications solution. A
complete state-of-the-art, secure, integrated
communications solution, including VoIP,
wireless LAN and VPN solutions will be provided
to the [Read more]
Tata Communications Awarded “Best Market
Strategy” at the 2008 Capacity magazine
Global Wholesale Telecommunications Awards
(November 18th, 2008)
Tata Communications, a leading provider of the
new world of communications, was honored
with the “Best Market Strategy” award at the
Annual Capacity magazine Global Wholesale
Telecommunications Awards in Amsterdam.
The awards, held at Capacity Europe 2008,
recognize significant key market players who,
through applying innovation and
[Read more]
BT launches sustainable development index
for India (November 18th, 2008)
Indian companies currently perform most
strongly for long-term economic growth and
most poorly in their management of water
resources TATA Group considered as top
corporate leader in sustainable development BT
announced today the launch of its “Sustainable
Development Index - an assessment of business
performance in India”. The SD index has been
developed [Read more]
Submarine Telecoms Forum is published bimonthly by WFN Strategies. The publication
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of the publishers.
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Submarine Telecoms Forum is an independent
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connected with submarine optical fibre
technologies and techniques.
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of this publication, the publishers cannot
be held responsible for the accuracy of the
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occur in advertising or editorial content, or
any consequence arising from any errors or
omissions.
The publisher cannot be held responsible
for any views expressed by contributors,
and the editor reserves the right to edit any
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publication.
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The credit crisis may well result in more
collaboration, with companies working together
to share building costs. The Unity Project is an
example of such a model - Bharti Airtel, Global
Transit, Google, KDDI Corporation, Pacnet
and SingTel are sharing the cost of building an
undersea cable from Tokyo to Los Angeles.
The New
Submarine
Paradigm
After the collapse of the previous submarine
cable boom at the end of 2001, BuddeComm
predicted a revival in this market before the end
of the decade. The first signs began to appear
in around 2004, coinciding with an increasing
demand for bandwidth. We were reasonably
confident in this prediction, as the submarine
market is fairly predictable, due to its relatively
lengthy planning and building cycles.
By
Paul Budde
and Kylie Wansink
The demand for bandwidth continues
to steadily increase. Around the world,
the Internet is becoming more and
more important to both the economy
and society. Web 2.0 services have
also fuelled the demand for bandwidth
as users embrace online video, music
and voice.
10
In response, there have been more
announcements of proposed submarine
cable system build-outs in recent years
than in any other time since the last
boom of 1998-2001. This activity in
There was actually nothing wrong with the
concept behind the dotcom era, but, as is now
being demonstrated in the subprime housing
market, greed can take over in the financial
sector and ruin things, for a time at least.
the submarine cable sector continued
throughout 2008 with many cable
build-out announcements coming from
around the world. Network upgrades
were also on the agenda for some
existing systems.
The impact of the global credit crisis
on the submarine cable sector in 2009
cannot yet be fully determined as many
current projects are already funded.
There are however many planned
projects still to be funded that may well
suffer as a result.
Dotcom was all about new applications that
would generate the next level of revenues for
the ICT industry.
The subscription-based model for telephony
and Internet services was approaching its
due-by date and new models were needed.
The dotcomers had the right vision at the time,
but the infrastructure needed to deliver those
applications was not available. And without the
necessary national infrastructure the demand
for international traffic declined, creating havoc
in the submarine telecoms market.
But then broadband infrastructure became
more available and applications such as
Google, YouTube, MySpace and FaceBook
became overnight successes. Then, of course,
the demand for international networks returned
and by 2007 new submarine networks started
to appear on the agenda. On the Pacific route,
for example, traffic is doubling every two
years.
However, by then the telecoms business
model had changed and those involved in
the new market didn’t wish to operate in the
international market in the same way the cosy
cartels had been doing for over one hundred
and fifty (!) years. But changes are also arriving
in this market. For example, in relation to the
proposed Unity Cable between Japan and
the US, consortium members like Pacnet are
allowed to operate fibre pairs independently in
the system.
Companies like Google now depend for their
revenue, and therefore their financial results,
on people having access to good quality
broadband, and that particular Internet media
company – now one of the largest companies
on earth – has a great deal of clout.
They are not at all interested in the old cartels;
they want competition and innovation that will
result in low cost access to their applications.
Australia, in particular, is – due to a lack of
competition in this market - suffering from
relatively high international access charges.
Because the Internet is an international system
the telcos and ISPs who deliver local access
are faced with very high international access
bills, which they naturally pass on to their
customers. This makes these services more
expensive in Australia than in markets where
there is more competition.
11
With its participation in the Unity Cable, Google
is set to become a strategic player in the
submarine business. It certainly doesn’t want
to become a telco, but it is using its money
and influence to steer the telco industry in the
direction it wants. And, as well as being good
for Google, this will also be good for future
telco applications developments.
The company is in the same position regarding
the US spectrum auctions, in relation to
more competitive local access networks (eg
wireless). The telcos would like to maintain the
status quo, with them being the gatekeepers
and toll collectors. But this is stifling competition
and innovation, and we need companies the
size of Google, News Limited and Microsoft
to liberate us from the iron grip the incumbent
telcos presently have on this market.
Pacnet is one of the other players in the Unity
submarine consortium. This company is an
international infrastructure operator, but it also
has a thriving ISP business and, like Google,
the latter requires good and affordable access
to advance along the lines mentioned above.
The Pacnet combination of being involved in
both international submarine networks and ISP
business makes sense from that perspective.
Over the last few years they moved their ISP
business away from the consumer market to
the business market and in that move they
have also become a major provider of IPbased solutions, serving the carrier market
as well as large enterprises and SMEs.
However in coming years they may have to
make a decision about which way to jump.
Once the submarine business has become
commoditised again it is in the interest of the
ISP arm to seek the best possible deal, even
though that may not be achieved through its
own internationals infrastructure business.
The submarine telecoms industry is
undergoing a transformation, and the two new
developments around Google and PacNet are
only the tip of the iceberg. Many more changes
will follow and these will lead to a much
healthier international telecoms environment
than we have seen in the past.
Paul Budde is the managing
director of BuddeComm,
a
global
independent
telecommunications
research and consultancy
company. It operates a global
network of 45 researchers
and consultants. The website
(www.budde.com.au) has
1,700 research reports
covering 170 countries, 400
companies and 200 technologies and applications.
The company operates what is believed to be the
largest telecommunications research service on
the Internet and has over 3,000 customers in 80
different countries.
Kylie Wansink is Senior
Analyst,
Global
at
BuddeComm,
and
has
been involved in corporate
research for more than
twelve years and has
extensive experience in the
telecommunications
and
IT sectors. Kylie is now
applying her skills to the
global portfolio of research
for the BuddeComm organisation. The expansive
suite of research reports provides a wide-ranging
insight into the worldwide telecom market and
the key trends occurring across the industry. In
particular, her work focuses on the emerging
developments in Digital Media and Next Generation
Telecoms. Prior to joining BuddeComm, Kylie was
involved in business research work for various
management consulting companies and holds a
degree in Information Management.
scanpartner Trondheim Foto: SPOT og Getty Images
arine depths
m
b
u
, Ne
xans goe deeper
At s
s
Erik Rynning Sales & Project Manager Offshore:
“We produced the so far world’s deepest umbilical which was
installed at 2350 metre in the Gulf of Mexico.”
Nexans was the first to manufacture
and install a 384 fibre submarine
cable. Nexans has qualified and
installed their URC-1 cable family for
fibre counts up to 384 fibres.
For further information please contact:
Nexans Norway AS
P.O. Box 6450 Etterstad
N-0605 Oslo Norway
Phone: +47 22 88 61 00
Fax: +47 22 88 61 01
Telecom:
Rolf Bøe
Phone: +47 22 88 62 23
E-mail: [email protected]
Oil & Gas:
Jon Seip
Phone: +47 22 88 62 22
E-mail: [email protected]
Because so much of your performance runs through cables
Global expert in cables
and cabling systems
Collaboration
The catalyst for growth
by Roland Lim
Few today will expect one network service provider
to cover the world alone. Telecommunications
carriers today are tuning in to collaborative
strategies in order to drive continued growth of
the industry through challenges of the global
economy.
A quick glance at the current telecommunications landscape will
reveal that the age where one global service provider can do it
all is clearly etched in history. It is evident that the new business
paradigm embraced by the telecommunications industry is that of
partnership and collaboration.
Collaboration for growth
David Reed, the American computer scientist and Massachusetts
Institute of Technology (MIT) alumni, who has been involved in the
early development of the fundamental TCP/IP networking protocol,
captured this shifting business paradigm in what is now known as
Reed’s allow users to form groups, the utility of large networks, can
scale exponentially with the size of the network.
The benefits of Reed’s law have certainly been embraced by today’s
business leaders, including those involved in telecommunications
and technology.
Findings from Frost & Sullivan’s recent CEO survey show that 58
percent of respondents acknowledged that forming “strategic
partnerships” is a key strategy for success. Yet beyond simply
acknowledging and recognizing this strategy, 54 percent of
respondents noted that it was one of their top three strategies for
future growth.
These CEOs were certainly not alone in their views on collaborating
for growth.
13
reprinted with permission from the Q1 2009 issue of PacnetNews Magazine
According to an article entitled “Which kind of collaboration is right
for you?” in the December 2008 edition of the Harvard Business
Review, the authors, Gary P. Pisano and Roberto Verganti, said “no
companies innovate alone” and acknowledged how a variety of
companies have worked with partners to create new technologies,
products and services. For example, they cited how technology
giant IBM has successfully set up a number of consortia with other
companies to develop next-generation semiconductor technologies.
Against the backdrop of the current economic
crisis, Manoj Menon, Managing Partner of
business growth consultancy Frost & Sullivan,
also stressed that “strategic partnerships are
key” to a company’s growth strategy.
John Hibbard, a telecommunications industry
consultant, pointed out that comparing
consortia subsea cable projects back then and
now, a key difference is in the constituents of
the consortia.
Subsea collaboration The idea of partnership
and collaboration to roll out new infrastructure
might not be an entirely new concept in the
telecommunications industry as a look back to
history will yield the fact that many international
projects have been collaborative.
“At the start of this decade, prompted by
enormous technological developments in
photonics, many entrepreneurs, leveraging the
buoyancy of Wall Street, initiated submarine
cable projects,” he noted. “More often than not,
such cables were owned by parties who were
not in the telecommunications, and frequently
from the finance industry. This meant that they
were not a source of traffic, and these projects
were seen as a potential for profit rather than
the provision of infrastructure.“
Yet, in the subsea cable industry, many of the
cables built at the start of the decade were
owned by standalone companies.
Bill Barney, Chief Executive Officer of Pacnet,
said, “If you look back at the subsea cable
investments during the heady days of telecoms
from 1998 to 2001, you could easily find more
than 10 cable projects that cost more than
$1 billion each, which were funded by single,
standalone companies.”
Having presided over Asia Global Crossing, one
of Asia’s Chapter 11 casualties from the telecom
fallout at the start of the decade, Mr Barney
noted that there is a stark difference in today’s
subsea cable investments. “Subsea cable
projects today are definitely more collaborative
and rational. Just look at the $7 billion or so
that is being spent on new cable projects in the
coming three years and you will see that almost
all of them are being built by consortia with
three or more partners.”
Earlier in 2008, Pacnet, together with Google,
Bharti Airtel, Global Transit Ltd., KDDI, and
SingTel, announced that they were partnering
to build Unity, a new $300 million trans-Pacific
subsea cable connecting Chikura, Japan to the
west coast of US.
14
Pacnet CEO Bill Barney
Mr Hibbard added, “Today there are very few
cables owned by parties who are not carriers
or service providers and who use the cable
for their own traffic as well as that of others.
As a consequence, there is less fragility now
as the cables are effectively infrastructure
investments.”
Another observation pointed out by Mr Barney
was that the rise of digital content was bringing
about collaboration with new parties in subsea
infrastructure rollouts. “With the growing
amount of digital content that we are seeing on
our networks, it doesn’t come as a surprise that
the digital content giants are looking for bigger,
faster pipes,” he said.
Citing the example of the Unity cable project,
which has Google as a partner, Mr Barney
noted, “We expect to see greater interest
from digital content providers, especially those
which deliver a lot of digital video content, in
collaborative infrastructure projects.”
Diversity and reach
In the face of recent natural disasters such as
the earthquakes in January 2008 that caused
damage to subsea cables that interrupted
Internet connectivity in the Middle East and
India, the need for network diversity and
redundancy has again been highlighted.
Referring to the Taiwan earthquake at the end
of 2006 which damaged most of the region’s
subsea cables, Wilfred Kwan, Chief Technology
Officer of Pacnet, commented that through the
incident – one which the company’s EAC cable
fortunately survived – the focus has shifted
towards supporting other carriers in routing
traffic to minimize economic impact on the
region, thus the need for improving network
redundancy has never been more pertinent in
the industry.
“With the increasing importance of subsea
infrastructure to modern-day commerce,
enterprises are also realizing the huge impact
that network incidents may have on their
returns,” said Mr Kwan.
According to a Gartner study, it was estimated
that the hourly cost of network downtime for
large corporations was $42,000. With a typical
business experiencing an average of 87 hours
of downtime a year, this results in a total loss
exceeding $3.6 million a year.
15
As a result, carriers have been busy carving
out collaborative partnerships through Network
to Network Interface (NNI) interconnections
to extend the reach and reliability of their
networks.
“While we own the EAC-C2C subsea cable
infrastructure that provides connectivity to
major cities in South-east and East Asia, we are
able to connect our customers almost anywhere
in the world – from Paris to South Africa to New
York – by collaborating with carrier partners
globally and delivering traffic through NNI
interconnections,” said Mr Kwan. “Likewise,
carriers from other parts of the world partner
with us to leverage EAC-C2C in reaching key
countries across Asia.”
Beyond infrastructure
Beyond building new subsea cable infrastructure,
carriers and service providers are taking
partnerships to a whole new level by rolling out
new services made possible by collaboration.
“Few carriers now try to do it all on their
own. They are realizing that by collaborating
with technology partners, they are able to
roll out new services that offer state-of-theart
technology and bring them to market faster
than they would be able to do alone,” said Mr
Kwan.
He cited Pacnet’s Managed Application
Acceleration Service as one of the examples
of collaborating with best-of-breed partners
to rapidly roll out industry-leading services.
“By
deploying
Riverbed’s
application
acceleration devices across our high-speed
network, customers can immediately enjoy
the advantages of state-of-the-art application
acceleration appliances across our network,
without worrying about compatibility and
configuration issues. I believe we are the first
service provider in Asia Pacific to partner with
Riverbed to roll out this leading edge application
across the region,” he said.
Security is another strategic area in Pacnet’s
product development roadmap, where a
collaborative strategy has been embraced.
“To deliver our latest security offerings, we
collaborated with MessageLabs, a recognized
leader in messaging security to provide our
customers with a comprehensive approach
to email, content and IM security,” said Mr
Kwan. “And more recently, we partnered Arbor
Networks to offer a distributed denial of service
(DDoS) mitigation solution for our IP transit
and Internet services customers.”
“It is important that we partner with leaders
in the field so we can guarantee that our
customers receive industry-leading products
and solutions,” Mr Kwan added.
Looking ahead
Collaboration is certainly not a strategy that
could be force fed. “Collaboration only works
effectively when there is win-win outcome for
the collaborators. Unless fairness and equity
exist, more energy will be spent on managing
relationships to the detriment of the project.
Collaborators must want to join willingly rather
than have them join grudgingly because they
see no other alternative,” advised Mr Hibbard.
But given the frequency of announcements of
new partnerships in telecommunications and
technology, collaboration appears to continue
unabated, regardless of the economic climate.
“The possibilities for collaboration are truly
limitless and we certainly expect to see new
partnerships within the carrier industry, as well
as new collaborative efforts beyond this space
in the coming year,” added Mr Barney.
Roland Lim is Senior Manager, Marketing and
Communications at PACNET.
Introducing Subsea Communications!
Greetings
all! Many of
you will have already
heard from me about the
new Subsea Communications
Conference that I am
introducing with the support
of Questex and on behalf of
the industry. I wanted to take
a few moments to provide you
some updates on the event.
First of all, I should once again express my
appreciation to the industry members who have
personally approached me and requested that
I introduce and manage a new event that is
specifically representative of industry interests
and concerns. As many of you know, I have a
passion for solid conference content, exciting
speakers, and memorable networking/social
events. It is absolutely my intention to bring
16
By Anne LeBoutillier
••
Emerging markets such as oil & gas,
and the potential for subsea and
satellite communications to provide key
transmission solutions
to you, the industry leaders, a high value,
business generating, fun, entertaining and
thoroughly insightful conference!
••
New subsea cable builds, installation and
maintenance initiatives, new technologies
I would also like to extend my thanks to those of
you who have contacted me with support
for this new event. The level of
enthusiasm that I have seen for
the Subsea Communications
Conference (and its location
at The Venetian Resort & Casino
in Macau, PRC) has been remarkable. I’ll
provide you a few statistics below that have
been indicative of the sort of interest and
enthusiasm I’ve received a bit later in this
article.
It is also my intention is to introduce a segment
on network optimization, which has become a
key issue for service providers, and I believe
will become a focus for large-scale enterprises
as time goes on. Is this a risk or an opportunity
for the subsea infrastructure? I hope you’ll find
the topic worthy of discussion.
On the Conference Content side: We received
a fantastic number of responses to an online
survey that my team put together – my thanks
to all of you who provided your thoughts! There
is general consensus on a few key topics such
as:
•• Demand for capacity and drivers of global
infrastructure/bandwidth usage, traffic
forecasting, video/data traffic growth
••
Supply and pricing of networks, capacity,
bandwidth, and competitive considerations
where multiple systems exist
••
Backhaul, city pops and co-location,
and the ability of subsea and wireless
technologies to work together to maximize
effect and minimize cost
••
The global financial distress and its effect
on subsea communications projects and
the telecom market in general
A couple of people requested topics relating
to human resources and people management,
which I have felt for years is or will be a critical
issue in the subsea communications industry,
where we tend to have highly specialized roles
with little attrition, resulting in the potential for
a talent gap in just a few short years. (Not to
suggest any of us is aging, but realistically, have
we done a good job of training replacements for
our specialized knowledge base?) I’m in the
process of working with a talent management
firm to pull together an enlightening and high
energy session on succession planning in a
highly specialized industry.
Finally, I’ve had a couple of requests for
a session on the environmental impact of
telecommunications, which in theory I love.
Unfortunately, the only environmental steps
that I’m seeing taken (other than the well
established shore end installation and cable
laying initiatives) is a reduction in power and
cooling among some telecom service providers.
If there are any slightly more exciting initiatives
out there that you know of, please alert me
and I’ll do my best to fit something into the
conference programme!
Finally, I promised a quick review of statistics.
The introductory email about the Subsea
Communications Conference was sent to
25,000 very targeted representatives of
the subsea, service provider, oil & gas and
investor industries. The “open rate” of the
email campaign among the subsea community
was the highest at well over 50% on average.
(Note: The average “email open” rate for an
electronic Direct Mail campaign is 11.80%, so
50% is a very solid rate of return and suggests
a high degree of interest in the conference,
at least conceptually.) The service provider
list opened the email at a rate of 30% (this
included a portion of the GTM ’08 list, so
should be relatively indicative of that group,
which I know is a focus point for many of
you). The investor group opened the email at
a rate of over 40%, which was a surprise to
me, and suggests a solid level of interest in
the telecom sector. (Note: This is a targeted
list of investors who have at some point in the
past held or considered telecom investments.)
The Oil & Gas group was the lowest – I clearly
have some work to do to ensure our emerging
market representatives participate in the
conference, but even at 17.5% they came
out above the average open rate for an email
Direct Marketing campaign.
17
We’re very excited to be bringing this
conference to the industry, and I want to point
out that the Early Bird special pricing offers a
significant discount at US$1359 – a price level
you won’t find at other telecom events firms
for a conference of this level, and another
indication of Questex’ very generous support
of this event. We’re also offering a subsidized
hotel rate for 2 nights at US$300, which
is payable as part of your delegate fee (in
recognition that some of your travel budgets
have been reduced for 2009). I’m hopeful that
you’ll be intrigued by both conference content
and very reasonable pricing, and consider
signing up early!
Thanks so much for your time. Wayne has been
fantastic in offering me some space to provide
you updates on the Subsea Communications
Conference in following issues, and it will be
my pleasure to keep you all informed. If this
article has generated some ideas that you’d
like to share please feel free to contact me
directly at [email protected].
I hope to see you this May in Macau!
Questex
Media
Group, Inc. is a global,
diversified
businessto-business
integrated
media and information
provider, headquartered
in Newton, MA. Questex
serves multiple industries
including
technology,
telecommunications, beauty, spa, travel,
hospitality,
leisure,
abilities,
home
entertainment, landscape design, building
services and natural resources through a
range of well-established, market-leading
publications, events, interactive media,
research, information and integrated marketing
services. The company’s media properties
include over 100 print and digital media
publications, 45 conferences, tradeshows and
events, as well as a range of research, data
and information products.
Questex Asia is the Asia-Pacific arm of
Questex Media, and has managed some of the
regions’ most established telecommunications
publications and enterprise-oriented technology
events. Questex Asia’s publication Telecom
Asia provides key decision-makers across all
sectors of the Asian telecom industry, including
managers and professionals of service
providers and enterprise users of telecom
services, with authoritative and independent
news, context and analysis in a timely and
relevant manner including print and electronic
delivery.
Brought to you by:
Media Supporters:
Announcing the Industry Conference of the Year.
Subsea Communications is a conference about the Supply, Demand, Price and Profit of undersea fiber optic
telecom infrastructure. The conference is unique in its in-depth review of market demand and demand
drivers for global telecom capacity, made possible by subsea infrastructure.
Date:
6-8 May 2009
Venue:
The Venetian Hotel & Casino
Macau, Republic of China
18
For more information visit: www.subseacommunications.com
Contact Anne Dellos LeBoutillier, Email: [email protected] Ph: +65-6395-4586
application” that would rapidly gobble up
all this capacity.
The Future’s Bright, the Future’s…….
In Asia and the Pacific
By Graham Evans
19
When the wheels fell off the submarine
cable industry in 2001, the interminable
post mortems that were conducted in
the press and at conferences repeatedly
pointed to the massive overbuild of long
haul system capacity, citing terabits of unlit
capacity, dark fibers and future upgrades
as reasons why we could be waiting many
years before new long haul systems would
be built (a fact that continues to be borne
out in the Atlantic). How many of us
sat through the depressing round table
discussions year after year at such august
events as PTC and SubOptic amidst ever
decreasing audiences as round after round
of retrenchments took their toll. At the same
time we were being repeatedly told that
the hangover we were suffering resulted
from over indulgence that had been made
possible by the combination of deregulation,
easy money and unsustainable or simply
bad business models, not to mention the
often vaunted belief that we were on the
cusp of the somewhat nebulous “killer
In the Pacific, much of the unlit capacity
remains, although some dark fibers have
been lit and some upgrades have been
implemented; however, Asia and the
Pacific led the way in the resurgence of the
submarine telecommunications industry;
in fact, as an Asia Pacific based company
strongly focused on the submarine cable
industry, it was with some relief that new
projects continued to be built even through
the worst of the slump. Of course, many
of these projects were comparatively
small domestic or intraregional systems
measured in hundreds rather than
thousands of kilometers in length, so
hardly testing the production capacity of
the major suppliers. During this period,
some significant systems were built such as
i2i and the Tata Indicom, system (TIC) both
linking Singapore to India, and of course
SEA ME WE 4 in 2004 which although an
Asia to Europe system, had significant
Asian influence driving it forward.
2006 saw the real beginning of the “boom”
we are currently experiencing, and this
boom was centered fairly and squarely
on the Asian and Pacific Regions. The
current round of activity started with the
Gondwana, Australia to New Caledonia
system incorporating new generation
“skinny route” technology; Telstra’s
Australia to Hawaii system was rolled out
about the same time and not one but four
trans Pacific systems were announced;
Trans Pacific Express (TPE); Asia American Gateway (AAG);
FLAG’s Eagle, Next Generation Network and the Google driven
Unity system. Of these four, TPE is in service, AAG is nearing
completion, Unity has been surveyed and will be installed in 2009,
and the FLAG Eagle system has been postponed.
Pacific Ocean with Planned Cable Systems
In the Central and South Pacific, the Honotua cable system
currently under construction uses thin route technology and will
provide domestic connections between French Polynesian islands
to Papeete on the main island of Tahiti and on to Hawaii. Pipe
Network’s PPC-1 Cable System is also under construction and will
be installed in 2009; PPC-1 will connect Guam, Madang in PNG
and Sydney, Australia. PPC-1 offers further expansion possibilities
with a second Australian landing in Brisbane and second PNG
landing at Popondetta. A branching unit off Sydney also provides
potential expansion to New Zealand with PPC-2 and/or Optikor
(see below).
In the Western Pacific, East and South East Asia a number of
intraregional systems have or are being constructed including
the East Asian segments of TPE connecting the PRC with Korea
and Taiwan; AAG which lands in the Philippines, Hong Kong,
Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore. Tata Communications
have linked their TGN Pacific system to the TIC Singapore
landing with their Intra Asia System linking India via Singapore
to Malaysia, Vietnam, Hong Kong and the Philippines, with
branching unit expansion possibilities into the PRC, Taiwan and
Thailand. Indonesia has seen new domestic systems built linking
islands within the Indonesian archipelago, with some extending
to Singapore including Matrix, Jakasusi, Jakabare and Batam
Singapore. The North and Eastern Pacific has also seen new builds
with the Alaskan Communications SPANDEX system, and the
NEPTUNE subsea observatory.
SJC
SJC Option
APCN3
APCN3
FLAG Eagle
PIPE
Honotua
SPIN
ASH
Pacific Ocean with As Laid Cable Systems
AAG
20
The Pacific has also seen the innovative and cost effective re use of
existing cable systems with the recovery of part of Pac Rim West
and re lay into Port Moresby, PNG, thus creating APNG2 the first
fiber optic connection between Australia and Papua New Guinea;
TPE
TPE
Tata Communication Intra Asia
Unity North
GONDWANA-1 & PICOT-1
Australia-Hawaii
Australia-Hawaii
TGN Pacific
whilst further east, the recovery of a section of Pac Rim East has
provided Western and US Samoa with a fiber optic connection to
Hawaii, creating the ASH system. In both these cases, although the
cable systems that were reused represent pre DWDM fiber optic
technology, each has at least 12 to 15 years of design live left and
will provide these communities with adequate capacity for the
remainder of the systems life.
Australia & Pacific with Planned Cable Systems
With the considerable investment that has already been made in the
Pacific, East and South East Asia, and the current global financial
mayhem that dominates the news media; what submarine cable
systems are we likely to see in the region going forward? What
we have seen in parallel with the investment in the Pacific is the
migration of activity to and beyond the Indian subcontinent to East
Africa and India Ocean, the Middle East, the Mediterranean and
Europe, as well as new projects being announced for West Africa.
Is the submarine telecom boom bubble therefore drifting away
from Asia and the Pacific; is it simply growing to cover more of the
planet; or, is it about to burst along with the world economy?
What this observer can see, albeit as a simple geoscientist, is that
new systems are still being announced for the Asia and the Pacific
region. Bidding activity has not noticeably declined and the
initiators of requests for ROM budgets for projects in the region
seem to be alive and well.
SJC
SJC Option
APCN3
APCN3
PIPE
Honotua
SPIN
ASH
Australia & Pacific with As Laid Cable Systems
The supply contract for South East Asia Japan (SJC) seems at the
time of writing about to be signed. This pan Asian system has
landing sites in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Philippines, Hong
Kong and Japan; the system has additional optional segments to
Vietnam and Guam. Installation is expected in 2010.
21
A so far weak echo on the radar scope is APCN-3; with ROM
budget prices having been sought; however, when will the region
be able to justify another pan Asian system with a footprint not
dissimilar to SJC and the Tata Communications Intra Asia system,
not to mention the South East Asian segments of AAG? The APCN3 configuration resembles that of its predecessors with landings
in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, Hong
AAG
TPE
TPE
GONDWANA-1 & PICOT-1
Australia-Hawaii
Australia-Hawaii
TGN Pacific
Kong, two landings in the Peoples Republic of China, Taiwan,
Korea and Japan.
Inset for Honotua
Elsewhere in South East Asia, Indonesian operators continue
to plan additional inter island domestic links with the Palapa
project being the most ambitious with the configuration
comprising up to 24 submarine cable links. Matrix have been
considering extending their system from Indonesia to Australia
and Ochre Networks have been planning a system from
Singapore to Australia which will also land in Indonesia.
An interesting project that at the time of writing is being tendered
is the South Pacific Island Network or SPIN. Conceptually this
system seems to fit the skinny route philosophy used on Honotua
and Gondwana in that with the small populations of the island
communities that the system will service, capacity is not an
issue; rather, the system will offer the potential of broadband
connectivity to these small populations who currently depend
on satellite communications. The SPIN system if implemented
is configured with a trunk connecting Noumea, New Caledonia
with Papeete, Tahiti in French Polynesia with branches to
Norfolk Island, Vanuatu, Fiji, Mata Utu, Western and US Samoa,
Alofi and Rarotonga. Other optional segments include landing
in Honiara, and Tonga. Work on this project is expected to start
in 2009 with installation in 2010.
Honotua
Inset for ASH
Two Trans Tasman Sea projects from Australia to New Zealand
are in various stages of planning, namely the proposed Optikor
cable that may connect via Pipe Networks PPC-1 BU1 into
Sydney or alternatively a direct point to point cable landing
directly in Australia. The second Trans Tasman system is
Telstra’s Tasman 3 cable that has been under discussion for some
time. 2009 is when work on either or both of these systems is
currently scheduled to commence.
22
Although, positive comments were made by Reliance at
Submarine Networks World in Singapore in August 2008 with
respect to the planned implementation of the FLAG NGN
system in Asia and across the Pacific; at the time of writing,
ASH
there appears to have been no further
movement on either the Trans Pacific
Eagle or Asian segments. Another
Trans Pacific cable that was initially
planned in 2007 is TPE Phase 2 that will
offer a second “express” route to China;
Phase 2A is already being implemented
which will connect Chikura, Japan to a
new branching unit in the Phase 1 cable
off southern Japan.
In conclusion, The Asia and Pacific
regions led the way during the current
boom in our industry, and whilst the
level of activity has extended well
beyond these regions, encouraging
signs are there that activity will continue
at least over the next year or so; having
said that; as the author is far from being
an economic clairvoyant there must
remain some questions on what impact
the current global economic woes may
have as we move into 2009.
With more than 30 years
experience as a marine
geologist
and
applied
geophysicist, Graham has
the dual role of Business
Development Director for
the EGS Survey Group
of companies worldwide
(EGS), and as a Board
Director and co-founder of EGS Survey in Perth,
Australia.
encouraged by to adapt engineering geoscience
procedures that Graham had developed for dredging
investigations, to the requirements of the submarine
telecommunications industry, in particular in the
field of burial assessment. Since that time, he has
become an enthusiastic and dedicated participant
in the submarine telecommunications community
becoming known throughout the industry for his
knowledge in the application of cross discipline
geoscience techniques and procedures, and as
a regular speaker on his specialist topics at
international conferences worldwide.
South East Asia with
Planned Cable Systems
SJC
APCN3
FLAG Eagle
South East Asia with As
Laid Cable Systems
Graham holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in
Geology from the University of Manchester, and
Bachelor of Arts Degree in Earth and Environmental
Sciences from the Open University.
AAG
TPE
TPE
23
Graham began specialising in submarine cable
route planning and survey in 1990 after being
Graham joined EGS in 1978 leaving in 1990
on what he describes as his 6 year sabbatical
to join as one of the first three employees of the
embryonic Fugro Survey where he played a key
part in developing that company’s submarine cable
business. In 1996, he rejoined EGS where he set
about to build EGS into a world leader dedicated
to the provision of cable route planning and survey
services. Graham is currently a member of the
SubOptic Executive Committee, and Vice Chair of
the SubOptic 2010 Program Committee.
Unity North
TGN Pacific
Graham is married, and wife Linda has on occasion
been heard to ruefully refer to his other marriage to
EGS. Outside of the work environment, Graham is
a keen but very bad golfer being consistently beaten
by his wife, he is an aviation bore having been a
private pilot for many years; he is a very keen
power walker and recently was asked by someone
less than half his age to reduce his pace; and he is a
music enthusiast, having a somewhat eclectic taste
but which is firmly founded in the classics.
Submarine telecom systems transmit data from shore
to shore. They achieve their high levels of reliability by
minimizing the amount and complexity of equipment
in the water. How, then, to maintain high reliability
in a system that transmits data from the seabed to
shore? That is the challenge that faces the NEPTUNE
Canada project team at the University of Victoria
(UVic), British Columbia, and its contractor, AlcatelLucent Submarine Networks (ALSN).
The NEPTUNE Canada Cabled Ocean Observatory
System is an underwater cable system built
specifically to support scientific research. For
the first time, NEPTUNE will enable collection of
oceanographic, seismic, climate, and ecosystem
data from deep under the ocean continuously in real
time, over its planned service life of twenty five years.
NEPTUNE Canada is the first part of a joint Canada
- US effort to provide access to the entire Juan de
Fuca tectonic plate, an area of over 200 000 km2
off the coasts of British Columbia, Washington, and
Oregon. UVic leads a consortium of twelve Canadian
universities responsible for implementation and
operation of NEPTUNE Canada with funding provided
by the Canada Foundation for Innovation and British
Columbia Knowledge Development Fund. Funding for
U.S. network is being sought from the US National
Science Foundation.
The NEPTUNE Canada
Cabled Ocean
Observatory System
25
NEPTUNE Canada represents a fundamental
step forward for the science of Oceanography.
Oceanographers have traditionally relied on ships,
buoys, or deep water moorings to collect data. Ships
can remain on station for only a limited time within a
narrow weather window, while buoys and moorings
have limited electrical power and data bandwidth, as
well as limited reliability. Out of commission telecom and
military cables have been used for scientific research,
but these may not be in ideal locations and also have
power or bandwidth limitations. Cabled observatories
have been built off the coast of Japan to support a
seismic network; however these observatories have
been unable to offer users the power required for
a wide range of their instruments and experiments.
Several “near-shore” single site observatories located
a few tens of kilometers off shore have been built and
operated successfully; NEPTUNE Canada will stretch
this limit to multiple sites and hundreds of kilometers.
NEPTUNE Canada’s ability to provide access to the
deep ocean environment, frequent data collection,
real time data delivery, instantaneous command
and control, and continuous long term observation
goes far beyond the capabilities of conventional
oceanography. NEPTUNE Canada will also provide
an outreach function for the science of Oceanography
by delivering real time video, still photographs and
data to schools, universities, policy-makers, and the
public throughout the world.
Major research themes for NEPTUNE Canada are
plate tectonics, seabed fluid dynamics including gas
hydrate formation, ocean climate change, marine
biology, and deep sea ecosystems. Initially, two sites
on the continental slope and two sites in deep water
have been selected for connection to NEPTUNE
Canada. The shelf slope sites are Folger Passage,
Barkley Canyon, a site of upwelling that is rich in ocean
life, and includes exposed layers of gas hydrates, and
Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) borehole 889, where
there are several existing drill holes and proximity
to gas hydrate mounds. The deep water sites are
ODP 1027, a drill hole site in the middle of the plate
adjacent to two sea mounts; and the Endeavour
Ridge, the site of numerous “black smokers” which
emit seawater heated to 375°C and which support a
food chain based on sulfide consuming bacteria and
Archea, believed to be among the oldest forms of life
on Earth. Additional nodes and sensors will be added
as funding and resources permit.
To achieve these ambitious goals, a network
infrastructure incorporating many novel design
elements is required. The NEPTUNE network
infrastructure consists of a conventional submarine
cable and repeaters configured in an 800 km loop
with both ends terminated in the former TPC-4 cable
station at Port Alberni, which has been purchased by
UVic. A series of underwater nodes are connected to
the backbone cable by means of branching units.
Branching units will be deployed for all the initial sites
when the backbone cable is laid. Observatory nodes
can be deployed immediately or added at a later
stage. The branching units provide power switching for
control and fault isolation. Optical signals are directed
to and from each node using a distributed DWDM
scheme. The use of repeaters and DWDM allows a
single fiber pair to serve all node locations. The node
itself consists of a large frame with two underwater
housings: one containing a power converter and the
other containing the communications equipment. Two
protected Gigabit Ethernet channels are provided
between each node and the shore station. NEPTUNE
relies on Ethernet and TCP/IP for communications
between instruments and a shore based Data
Management and Archive System (DMAS). Precision
timing is transmitted to the instruments using the IEEE
1588 Precision Time Protocol.
This network infrastructure represents a paradigm
shift for submarine cable technology by providing
communications to the seabed rather than just
across it. At each subsea node location, the optical
line is terminated and Ethernet switches distribute
communications to the scientific instruments or to
extension cables. This means that terminal equipment
normally housed in an environmentally controlled
cable station must be adapted for use in underwater
housings. The use of a repeatered solution allows
conventional 2.5 Gb/s transponders to be used while
still reaching locations that may be several hundred
kilometers from shore.
Designs using long spans and full regeneration at the
underwater nodes were also considered and may be
used in the future depending on the desired system
configuration. Along with data to and from the seabed,
NEPTUNE can deliver up to 100 kW of electrical power
for operation of communications equipment, sensors,
cameras, lights, and potentially remotely operated
vehicles. This level of power delivery is made possible
by increasing the line current from around 1 ampere
in a typical telecom system to as much as 8 amperes
while maintaining a voltage of 10kV on each shore
end. At each node, a custom built DC-DC voltage
converter accepts an input voltage from 5 to 10 kV
and provides a 400 V, 10 kW output.
Seawater provides the return path from each node to
the shore station. Since each node provides a load
between the cable and seawater, the loads seen by
the power feed are in parallel, rather than in series
as in a conventional repeatered system. The 400V
intermediate voltage is used for distribution of power
to the instruments.
26
At each primary node, a series of up to six secondary
Junction Boxes (JBs) are connected by means
of underwater mateable connectors.
Scientific
instruments are connected in turn to the JBs. The JB
adapts the communications interfaces used individual
instruments to Ethernet and also allows control of the
power supply to each instrument.
Instruments will be deployed on the seabed, within
sea floor boreholes and buoyed up through the
water column at particular locations. As might be
expected, a system such as NEPTUNE with many
stakeholders to satisfy and a limited budget can also
be challenging to specify, design, and project manage.
UVic, recognizing its lack of experience in this field,
went outside academia and hired key elements of
its project team from industry. Despite building on
existing experience, the process of defining realistic
purchaser’s requirements has stretched over several
years, with the project team working iteratively between
the scientific communities in Canada and potential
suppliers. The supplier selection process was to
first qualify potential suppliers, and then to distribute
for comment a complete draft Request for Proposal
package before (re)writing and issuing the final RFP.
This process ensured the user’s requirements were
realistic, within the suppliers’ ability to deliver, and
within budget. The evaluation and selection process
then took almost twelve months, culminating with
an award to ALSN in October 2005. The design,
prototyping, and demonstration phases will take a
further twelve months. Cable laying operations are
scheduled for summer of 2007, at which time a set
of test instruments will be deployed. Finally, the main
scientific instruments will be deployed and connected
to the network during the summer of 2009.
In addition to all the usual challenges of permitting,
coordination with other seabed users and supplier
management, NEPTUNE has several unique
concerns. The nature of the scientific sites means
the seabed installation is, to say the least, complex.
Deployment of the nodes and instruments will require
ROV operations. Instruments have to be adapted,
or designed from scratch, to work on a cabled
network rather than batteries. A data management
and archiving system has to be designed to handle
the unprecedented amounts of oceanographic data.
The operations and maintenance phase will include
annual cruises to repair and replace instruments as
well as on-demand cable ship repairs when failures
occur in the network infrastructure.
And, because NEPTUNE has the potential to collect
sensitive acoustic data, national security has become
matter of some importance, requiring dialogue with
the Canadian and US navies.
Reliability has been an overriding goal throughout the
design process and there are many network features
that address reliability. First, the network forms a
ring, so every node has two paths to shore. All node
components have at least 1:1 redundancy. The power
converter consists of a stack of building block units
which provide multiple levels of redundancy. Single
points of failure, such as repeaters and branching
units, are built to the levels of reliability established
for commercial telecom cable systems. In spite of
the reliability and redundancy, many of the node
components are Commercial-off-the-Shelf (COTS)
and failures are inevitable.
When failures occur, the node housings can be
detached from the base frame and floated to the
surface by an ROV. Syntactic foam ensures neutral
buoyancy. The node can be immediately replaced
with a spare, or refurbished and redeployed later.
While it sounds counterintuitive, computer modeling
shows the best maintenance strategy is to wait for a
VPS Undergoing Testing
at NGK’s Facility, Saitama, Japan
complete failure (i.e. both redundant components
have failed) before undertaking a repair. Because
of the down-time involved in making a repair,
proactively replacing failed units actually results
in more unavailable time than waiting for a failure,
even though a longer outage will be experienced
when a complete failure occurs.
Overall network availability is expected to be in
the range of 96% to 97%, which is surprisingly
good considering that a node repair may take
weeks or months. One of the exciting aspects of
NEPTUNE is the potential to utilize the technology
in other applications. The availability of broadband
communications and generous amounts of power
at locations hundreds of kilometers from shore
opens up many new possibilities for both scientific
research and for equipment development and
qualification.
Communications systems for remote monitoring
and control of well heads, continuous seismic
monitoring of oil fields, and communications to
high risk work areas are some of the areas in
which NEPTUNE Canada technology could be
used, and in which NEPTUNE Canada could be
used as an equipment proving ground. Military
and port security applications are also possible;
use of an off-the-shelf solution which can support
hydrophone arrays and other sensors would
reduce or eliminate development effort for new
sensor networks. Given NEPTUNE Canada’s
position as a research facility, it is likely some
of these new concepts and applications will
be tested on NEPTUNE Canada itself before
deployment elsewhere. Can UVic successfully
complete this demanding project? All the key
pieces are in place: an experienced project
team, an industry-leading supplier, support from
the academic community and funding agencies,
and realistic objectives. However, it is too soon
to celebrate; much work lies ahead. UVic and
Alcatel are committed to delivery of a working
system by 2009. If NEPTUNE Canada achieves
the goals it has set for itself, it will open up both
a new realm of Oceanography and new markets
for the submarine cable industry. New challenges
and new ways of thinking can provide a much
needed boost to both morale and the bottom line.
27
NEPTUNE Canada Update
By Chris Barnes, Steve Lentz, and Peter Phibbs
2008 saw continuing efforts to develop and qualify the
power delivery subsystem. Setbacks can be expected
in the development of new underwater devices
such as NEPTUNE Canada’s 10kV equipment, and
the setbacks experienced in 2008, while relatively
modest in nature, have resulted in a decision to
defer deployment of the nodes, junction boxes and
instruments until summer 2009. (The backbone
cable, repeaters, and branching units were installed
in 2007.) Ships are now being secured for the
deployment of five primary nodes, along with fourteen
junction boxes and as many as 130 instruments,
during the summer of 2009. This installation program
will require two vessels, a stern working cable ship
and a research vessel. The ROPOS ROV, operated
by the Canadian Scientific Submersible Facility, will
be a vital participant in the deployment activities.
The readiness of two key components led to the
decision to defer deployment to 2009. The Medium
Voltage Converter (MVC), which converts backbone
cable voltages of 6 to 10kV to a working level of 400V,
and the connector which delivers 10kV DC to the node
have required further design effort and qualification
testing. Prototypes of the MVC have been tested
and shown to meet all primary design requirements;
however, additional testing has revealed some
concerns as to the reaction of the MVC to faults
elsewhere in the system. These concerns have led to
some minor redesign and, of course, a repeat of most
of the time consuming qualification tests. Similarly,
the 10kV connector has been successfully tested, but
concerns about design margin and operational life
have led to some rework and a restart of the three
month long accelerated aging tests. The need to
resolve these technical challenges led to a mutual
decision on the part of NEPTUNE Canada and its
prime contractor, Alcatel-Lucent Submarine Networks,
to postpone installation.
2008 saw successful progress on a number of fronts.
All the terminal equipment and power feed equipment
has been delivered and installed. The Junction Boxes
(JBs), which provide an intermediate connection
point between up to ten individual instruments
and the primary nodes, have been designed and
manufactured by Oceanworks, Inc. of Vancouver,
Canada. Successful integration tests between the
JBs and primary nodes were completed in July of
2008 and the first JB was deployed on the VENUS
observatory in December. Fabrication and assembly
of the primary nodes by Alcatel-Lucent Submarine
Networks with the support of its subcontractors L3
Maripro and Texel is progressing well. The Vertical
Profiling System (VPS), which consists of a base
platform and a float containing science instruments
which can be raised and lowered through the water
column, has been manufactured by NGK of Japan
and delivered to Victoria BC. In addition, transitional
operational funding was secured from the Natural
Sciences and Engineering Council of Canada
(NSERC), the Canada Foundation for Innovation
(CFI), and the British Columbia Ministry of Advanced
Education.
NEPTUNE Canada is an exciting and innovative project
which demonstrates how commercial submarine
telecom technologies can be adapted for other
uses. The science data it makes possible is going
to allow us to see and hopefully understand better
how the oceans systems work, and how they affect
both marine and land-based life. NEPTUNE Canada
offers a platform for testing future technologies in real
life situations in the deep ocean – and lets developers
watch and operate their new technology from their
desks in Houston, Aberdeen, Perth or anywhere with
an internet connection. Next year promises to be
even more eventful as the nodes, junction boxes and
instruments are finally installed. NEPTUNE Canada
looks forward to sharing our news and seeking your
participation in the program as it evolves.
Chris Barnes is Project Director
for NEPTUNE Canada. After
being awarded his Bachelor
of Science from the University
of Birmingham (1961) and his
Ph.D. from the University of
Ottawa (1964), he received
an academic appointment at
the University of Waterloo in
1965. He served as Chair of
Earth Sciences at Waterloo
from 1975 to 1981. In a similar position at Memorial
University (1981-87), he established the Centre of
Earth Resources Research. From 1987-1989, as
Director General, Sedimentary and Marine Branch,
Geological Survey of Canada, he was responsible
for the offshore Frontier Geoscience Program. At the
University of Victoria, Chris was Director of both the
Centre of Earth and Ocean Research (1989-2000)
and the School of Earth and Ocean Sciences (19912002, then becoming the NEPTUNE Canada Project
Director in 2002.
28
Steve Lentz has over fifteen
years experience in the
construction and operation
of optical communications
networks including metropolitan
area
networks,
national
networks, and international
submarine cable networks.
He has served as VP Network
Engineering and Deployment
for 360networks’ submarine
division where he developed the network architecture,
functional
requirements,
and
performance
specifications for international submarine cable
networks and supervised testing, commissioning,
and verification of compliance with contractual
requirements. He was Manager of Transmission
Engineering for Time Telekom, Sdn. Bhd. located
in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia, and Director of Systems
Engineering for Lightwave Spectrum, Inc. He joined
WFN Strategies in 2005 as Project Manager, and has
supported telecom projects in Oklahoma, Antarctica,
West Africa and the Gulf of Mexico. Peter Phibbs is Associate Director, Engineering and
Operations for NEPTUNE Canada. An engineer
with construction in the marine environment, Peter
has a wide range of experience in managing the
implementation of complex deepwater projects. After
completing his B.Sc. in Engineering Science from
the University of Durham, UK,
he practiced engineering as a
designer of marine structures
in the UK, the Middle East
and then in Vancouver, British
Columbia. He became a
member of the Institution of
Civil Engineers in 1978, and
a member of the Professional
Engineers of British Columbia
in 1981. In 1986 he began
specializing in underwater construction, managing
construction and maintenance projects at variety of
sites in North America and around the world.
consequence of the number of islands to
be joined and seas to be crossed. But more
importantly, it has anticipated a massive future
demand for bandwidth between the major
Asian centres and between Asia and the rest
of the world. And that will only be satisfied by
undersea cables. While operators were rewriting their business plans as a consequence
of the earlier slowdown that had occurred,
it had nevertheless been self-evident that
optical fibre submarine cabling would continue
to play a major role in telecom infrastructure
development in the Asia-Pacific region.
Spotlight on Asia Pacific
By Peter Evans
For some years, the area of telecommunications
infrastructure most in trouble across the
Asia-Pacific region has been the struggling
submarine cable business. In the late 1990s,
companies such as Level 3, Asia Global
Crossing and FLAG Telecom constructed a
massive amount of capacity with billions of
dollars in investments, only to find weakening
demand and declining bandwidth prices.
29
The market moved into crisis in 2001 and
major restructuring began to occur within the
sector. The depressed market persisted even
as prices continued to fall. The situation finally
started to change in 2006, when a series of
new submarine infrastructure projects for the
Asia-Pacific region were announced. There
were all the signs of recovery in the market
with a significant increase in business activity
occurring over the 2007/08 period.
It is estimated that Asia has been the recipient
of about one third of the worldwide investment
in submarine cabling. This has been a natural
The general perception of a glut in bandwidth
capacity on Asia-Pacific routes also caused
some confusion in the market. It was certainly
true that investment in submarine cables was
no longer bringing the rapid returns it once did.
Companies were finding it increasingly difficult
to raise capital for undersea cable ventures as
a consequence. At the same time, customers of
undersea cable operators were finding it difficult
at times to get enough capacity on Asia-Pacific
undersea routes. Consequently operators built
the largest possible cables to meet demand
and gain a cost advantage over competitors.
A combination of sluggish global and regional
economies conditions, the perception of overcapacity on some routes, and questions about
the level of return on investment inevitably saw
a slowdown in the construction of submarine
cables in the region.
The oversupply of submarine cable capacity
in the region has been in the intra-regional
networks rather than in the large regional
and trans-Pacific cables. A significant number
of new intra-regional cables have come into
service over the last few years. These included
FNAL (FLAG North Asian Loop), EAC (East
Asia Crossing), APCN 2 and C2C, resulting in
around 16Tb/s of extra capacity. Only a tiny
fraction of this capacity was being used. On
the other hand, the trans-Pacific routes were
not seen to have this luxury of oversupply of
capacity and the pressure to lay more such
cables has been steadily mounting.
Despite the fact that market rationalisation
was taking place in Asia, there remained a
flood of capacity and regional carriers were
still struggling. Cross-border capacity prices
were continuing to slide throughout Asia.
30
The formation of Reach Ltd in 2000 saw a
significant player enter the market. Comprising
a 50-50 joint venture between Australia’s
Telstra and Hong Kong’s PCCW, it resulted
in the consolidation of a global network with a
strong Asian focus. Reach gained an ownership
interest in around 50 submarine cable systems.
The operator signalled its intention to further
consolidate its market position when, in late
2001, it acquired the Asian assets of Level 3
Communications. These included Level 3’s
North Asian cable system and capacity on the
Japan-US (J-US) cable system, as well as data
centres in Hong Kong and Tokyo. It followed
this up by signing major capacity leasing and
interconnect deals with Level 3 to strengthen
its global capability. However, the fragile
nature of this market was highlighted when, in
February 2003, Telstra and PCCW announced
a dramatic write down of their Reach assets,
after reduced demand and tough price
competition seriously damaged revenues. The
write-down totalled US$1.6 billion in value and,
in Telstra’s case, an adjustment of US$546
million meant that the value of its stake in
Reach had been reduced to zero.
Demand for international capacity continued
to be the fundamental engine driving
submarine cable system deployment in the
Asia-Pacific region. The vast majority of
that demand will result from data/Internetrelated usage. The second ranked segment
in terms of demand was corporate, but that
only accounted for less than 10% of overall
demand. The strong demand for bandwidth
coming from India and China has resulted
in a more aggressive involvement of
operators from these two countries in the
submarine cable market. From India in
particular we have seen VSNL, Bharti
Tele-ventures and Reliance Infocomm all
moving into the business of international
telecoms infrastructure, with a strong focus
on submarine cables.
By early 2006, following several rough
years, the global bandwidth market was
showing signs of improved health in the
form of supply equilibrium, price stability
and competitor consolidation. Persistent
international bandwidth demand growth
has depleted the amount of spare capacity
on many submarine cables. This resulted in
many network operators, including VSNL,
FLAG Telecom and Asia Netcom, among
others, lighting additional wavelengths
and fibre pairs on an ‘as-needed’ basis.
This incremental approach to managing
spare circuit inventories has meant that lit
bandwidth supply and bandwidth demand
were coming into balance. This did not
mean, however, that a network construction
Major submarine cables
in the Asia-Pacific region - 2008
Cables
Countries connected
AJC
Australia-Japan (via Guam; also
proposed link to US)
APCN (part of
AOFSCN)
Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong
Kong, the Philippines, Indonesia,
Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand
APCN 2
China, Hong Kong, Japan, South
Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines,
Singapore and Taiwan
BMP
Brunei-Malaysia-Philippines
B-S (part of
AOFSCN)
Brunei-Singapore
C2C (Northern
loop)
China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan,
Korea, the Philippines
C2C (Southern
loop)
Hong Kong, Singapore, the
Philippines
China-US
Cable (CUCN)
Japan, US, China, Korea, Taiwan,
Hawaii, Guam
CJC
China-Japan
CKC
China-Korea
Dumai Melaka
Cable (DMCS)
Indonesia-Malaysia
EAC (East Asia
Crossing)
Japan, China, Singapore, Hong
Kong, Taiwan, South Korea,
Malaysia, and the Philippines
FLAG
UK-Korea-Singapore-Hong KongIndonesia-Japan
G-P-T/
HONTAI-2/HJ-K
Guam-Philippines-Taiwan, Hong
Kong-Taiwan, Hong Kong-JapanKorea
HJK
Hong Kong-Japan-Korea
Honphil 2
Hong Kong-Philippines
Hontai 2
Hong Kong-Taiwan
i2i Network
India-Singapore
JAKABARE
Indonesia – Singapore (Java –
Kalimantan – Batam – Singapore)
JASURAUS
Australia-Indonesia
boom was pending. Instead, operators
needed to make more of what they already
had. According to TeleGeography, by the end
of 2006 little more than 14% of the potential
capacity on major submarine cables around
the world was lit.
By mid-2007, there were at least six new cable
projects mooted to cross the Pacific and help
meet a particular predicted shortfall in capacity
between Asia and the US as Asia’s broadband
usage increases. Asia Netcom CEO Bill Barney
said that stocks then in existence may well be
exhausted by as early as 2013 but he warned
that should all six proposed cable systems
come to market, competition would consign
them all to failure. In September 2007, Level 3
was warning of a trans-Pacific capacity bubble
by 2009, although not all carriers agreed with
this view. Level 3 believed that with eight
cables planned for deployment on the transPacific route over a two-year period the risk
of such a bubble was high. While there were
real drivers for new Asia cables – revenues
remained relatively high and there was an
obvious need for diversity – there was also
potential for over reaction. Plans already in
place would see six new east-west cables –
TPE, AAG, Asia Netcom, Flag, Japan-US and
Unity – rolled out in 2008/09 and another two
north-south from Telstra and Pipe Networks
planned over the same period. From about
2Tb/s of lit capacity in place, the proposed
cables were set to release as much as 6Tb/s
of initial lit capacity on the market.
31
The level of activity in the sector may be curbed
somewhat in 2009 in the wake of the financial
crisis. The large telcos in Asia may take a
Major submarine cables
in the Asia-Pacific region - 2008
more cautious approach to infrastructure
investments.
Peter A. Evans is
Senior Analyst, Asia,
at BuddeComm. After
more than thirty years
of
corporate
and
international experience
in telecommunications
and IT, including as an
executive manager with
the Australian incumbent
telco, Telstra, Peter Evans is now applying his
extensive background to conducting market
analysis and research work for the BuddeComm
organisation. Having joined this telecom market
research company in 2000, his responsibilities
quickly expanded until he was looking after the
entire Asian market. The extensive portfolio of
research reports that has been built up over
time provides a comprehensive insight into
the telecom markets of Asia; whilst inevitably
there is a major focus on the burgeoning mobile
and broadband market segments, the key
regional undersea cable market is an area of
particular research interest. As part of his work
for BuddeComm, Peter has an office in South
East Asia and continues to spend a significant
amount of his time in and around the Asia
region. Prior to joining BuddeComm, Peter
was involved in business development work for
Telstra as that company sought new markets in
Asia. He also spent six years working in Saudi
Arabia as the Senior Advisor to the General
Manager, Strategic Planning in Saudi Telecom.
Cables
Countries connected
JUS
Japan, Hawaii, US
KJCN
Korea–Japan (two links)
M-T (part of
AOFSCN)
Malaysia-Thailand
Nava-1
Australia, Singapore, Indonesia
PacRim East
New Zealand-Hawaii
PacRim West
Australia-Guam
Pacific
Crossing (PC1)
Japan (Ajigaura; Shima), US
RJK
Russia-Japan-Korea
RNAL (Reach
North Asia
Loop)
Japan-Korea-Taiwan-Hong Kong
SAFE
South Africa-Far East
SEA-ME-WE 2
South East Asia-Middle EastWestern Europe
SEA-ME-WE 3
In Asia: Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka,
Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia,
Indonesia, Singapore, Australia,
Malaysia, Brunei, Vietnam,
Philippines, Macau, Hong Kong,
China, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan.
SEA-ME-WE 4
In Asia: Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka,
Bangladesh, Thailand, Malaysia,
Singapore
TIS cable
Thailand-Indonesia-Singapore
TPCN3/HAW-4
US-Hawaii-Japan
TPCN4
US-Japan-Canada
TPCN5
US-Japan-Guam
TVH (part of
AOFSCN)
Thailand-Vietnam-Hong Kong
VSNL
Transpacific
Japan-US
(formerly Tyco
Transpacific)
Japan-Guam
(Source: BuddeComm - Asia - Infrastructure - Submarine Cables)
Note: AOFSCN is the ASEAN Optical Fibre Submarine Cable Network
Pacific Outlook
The other major factor is the insatiable
demand by modern human societies to
communicate. There are still many millions
of people yet to regularly experience, enjoy,
and benefit from basic on-line connectivity,
fixed or wireless. Many of these people
are in the Pacific region, and they are
from economies that have the potential
to sustain the development of modern
communications infrastructure.
By Brett O’Riley
As that demand has continued to
increase, we have seen some interesting
developments that I expect to see continue.
Machine to machine communications is a
major area of demand growth, and I see
plenty of signs that over time the demand
from these applications, be it RFID,
vending machines, oil field monitoring
or radio telescopes; will be as large in
capacity terms as the communications
requirements generated by people.
2009 dawns and for many of us there
is a sense of déjà vu.
32
A period of dramatic building activity
in the submarine cable industry driven
by carriers and new market entrants;
followed by a financial crisis that catches
projects and operators in various states
of completion and confidence. On the
face of it the parallels with the “tech
wreck” are there as the debt markets
have contracted or closed to all but the
best of investment propositions.
While the magnitude of the “financial
crisis” facing the global economy is
without doubt, I believe there is good
reason to believe that 2009 will present
a positive outlook for the Pacific
region. I make no apologies for being
an optimist in my view. After 20 years
in telecommunications I think the
underlying industry growth rate, coupled
with our ability to continually drive
down operating costs, has created an
extremely resilient telecoms industry.
2008 was a year of significant milestones
in Asia-Pacific that will continue to
positively impact our industry in 2009:
• The completion of the Trans Pacific
Express cable system between the
People’s Republic of China and the USA,
the first of the latest generation of transPacific cables.
• The completion of the Endeavour cable
between Australia and Hawai’i.
• The development of the Japan to USA
Unity cable system representing a different
joint venture model for development, with
elements of consortiums and private
systems included.
• Significant upgrades of existing systems
throughout Asia-Pacific.
• The continued emergence of niche
regional submarine cable operators like
Matrix (Indonesia), Pipe (Australia), OPT
(French Polynesia), True (Thailand), Kordia
(New Zealand), and Ochre (Australia); all
at different stages of execution with their
solutions to address specific demand/
supply imbalances in their respective
markets, many of them addressing
developing countries.
• The growth of Asian intra-regional
traffic as internet content and sites are
developed, reducing the reliance on the
USA as the global internet host.
• An increasing focus by countries
on national broadband initiatives as a
strategic economic and social development
platform, with countries including Malaysia,
Singapore, Australia, New Zealand
developing new broadband infrastructure,
to match early regional leaders like Korea,
Japan and Hong Kong.
• Growing demand for submarine cable
solutions by specific industries, particularly
oil and gas, which can also potentially
facilitate hybrid regional solutions.
• Continued dramatic increases in
bandwidth utilisation by mobile users, with
the expansion of 3G and other wireless
data standards, and the development
of internet oriented devices under the
I-Phone, Android, Windows Mobile, and
Symbian standards.
33
So what should we see in 2009?
Underlying demand looks set to continue
to grow. Many carriers I have spoken
with predict traffic volumes will grow
based on the experience of previous
economic cycles, as their customers use
telecommunications as a substitute for
travel, assuming that talk of a “depression”
is at the extreme of the economic downturn
outcomes.
3G networks will continue to expand
throughout the region; coverage is
still limited in most countries to large
urban areas.
China’s development
and implementation of their unique 3G
standard is being keenly watched by the
handset industry. This mobile growth will
be voice and data, the latter fuelled by
M2M applications.
Social networking will continue to power
demand for ISPs, Generation Y should
be renamed “V” for video, whether it is
self generated, music clips, movies or
other forms of entertainment. VOIP using
Skype or other providers continues to
rise, while Google continues to stimulate
consumer interest with its wide range of
applications. How did we manage before
Google Earth?
Expectations for the development of new
infrastructure does need to be tempered by
the fact that debt financing for any projects
will be challenging over the next 12 months,
but strong balance sheets and underlying
demand will enable projects to proceed. In
addition governments throughout the region
from Indonesia to the USA are looking at
national broadband infrastructure projects
to stimulate economic growth.
Asian customers will have unprecedented
access to submarine international capacity,
to meet their intra-regional requirements
and for onward connectivity to the USA
and Europe. There will be significant new
submarine capacity available intra-Asia
from a number of systems including:
• The new Tata linear system from
Singapore to Japan, with spur connections
to underserved markets.
• Potential new links from Pacnet’s multiring network into underserved countries in
Asia.
• Completion of the delayed Asia America
Gateway providing South Asia and Hong
Kong connectivity through to the USA.
• Completion of Indosat’s new Jakabare
system from Jakarta to Singapore.
• Upgrades of existing systems including
SEA-ME-WE 3 & 4.
There are also a number of proposed
intra-Asia systems including SingaporeJapan Cable, APCN-4 and Intrepid to meet
forecast demand.
Elsewhere in the region Pipe’s system
from Australia to Guam, will also provide
new connectivity for Papua New Guinea.
It is great to see a developer embrace
the opportunity to address Third World
requirements.
Other systems have recently been
built that go past Pacific Island nations
that are crying out for submarine cable
capacity, without any concern from the
system developer for the potential positive
economic and social development impact
a spur could have made. As an industry
we must make sure this does not happen,
and it is only through a few visionaries like
John Hibbard that opportunities for small
countries are realised.
There is NGO development funding
available to assist with spur extensions
that can be utilised. It is also pleasing to
see the French Government support for
the Honotua cable from French Polynesia
to Hawai’i.
Demand from non carriers for submarine
cable solutions continues to grow,
particularly in the oil & gas industry.
Unfortunately planning and decision cycles
in the industry can often be protracted, which
has been frustrating for potential suppliers
from our industry. But the underlying
demand and interest in higher capacity to
serve off-shore facilities is definitely there
across multiple fields in multiple countries,
particularly for new fields.
34
As automation increases and operators
become more focussed on availability,
submarine cables become essential. A lot
of the activity in the oil & gas industry is
below the radar screen. I expect 2009 to
be a landmark year for submarine cable
development in oil & gas, and do not be
surprised to see hybrid system solutions
meeting their demand and third parties
including local carriers.
There will of course continue to be
challenges during 2009 beyond the financial
sector issues. Permitting and licensing
in the Pacific can be complicated, with
countries at various stages of deregulation,
and different focuses including national
security being brought to bear.
Even the most powerful and experienced
consortiums have run up against this
issues, and the continued costs for all
industry participants has been high from
the consequent delays. Perhaps as an
industry we need to quantify the economic
costs to greater extent to bring these issues
into focus for policy makers.
On the system manufacturing side the
hump of demand for new systems seems to
be over. New market entrants are starting
to make an impression as their technology
is proven in an operating environment.
Cable kilometre demand is reducing for
manufacturers as the long-haul systems
mentioned above have been implemented,
or are about to be.
All of this should be good for lowering
unit costs for developers after a period
where system pricing per kilometre raised
dramatically, some of it driven by increases
in input commodity costs for steel and
fuel.
Hopefully the 2008 high growth period will
have assisted with profitability for industry
suppliers, as we now face potentially
less frenetic demand from the telcos in
2009. Oil & gas, off-shore wind farms
and scientific projects should continue
apace reducing the impact of a slowing in
the long-haul system development cycle.
These requirements and some of the
tricky smaller systems in Asia will require
experienced marine installers, and clever
system design, ensuring plenty of exciting
challenges for industry participants.
There remain concerns that there is a
growing skill shortage in the industry,
exacerbated by the smaller number of
manufacturing plants and installation
vessels. There has been new investment
in the industry which is welcomed.
Brett O’Riley is Managing
Director of Ochre Services,
and has been closely
involved in the Asia-Pacific
telecoms
infrastructure
business since 1989. He
was a member of the initial
team that developed the
Southern Cross Cable
system between Australia, New Zealand, Fiji
and the United States of America. Southern
Cross is globally recognised as an outstanding
success story in how to develop an independent
wholesaler of broadband capacity.
Brett
also looked after the North American market
and related projects for Southern Cross,
and later was a founder of Nava Networks,
which was established to develop broadband
opportunities in the region. Most recently
Brett has been in senior roles at Telecom NZ,
managing ICT merger and acquisition activity,
and the corporate mobile market.
CALL FOR PAPERS
The International Cable Protection Committee (ICPC) is planning
its next Plenary meeting in Florida, USA during the period 21 - 23 April 2009 inclusive.
All of the World’s major telecommunications companies are represented within the ICPC whose principal purpose
is to promote the safeguarding of submarine cables against man-made and natural hazards. This unique and
prestigious organisation also serves as a forum for the exchange of technical, environmental and legal information
concerning the marine aspects of both telecommunications and power submarine cable systems.
The theme of this Plenary meeting will be:
Submarine Cables: The Challenges of Protecting Critical Infrastructure
The Executive Committee (EC) therefore seeks presentations from interested parties that address the importance and challenges of
protecting submarine cables. Topics could include, but are not limited to:
Impact of Submarine Cable Failures on the Modern World
•
Legal / Regulatory Challenges & Solutions
•
•
Reducing the Risk from Man-Made & Natural Hazards
•
•
Speeding up the Cable Repair Process
Working with International Organisations to Improve Cable Protection
•
Emerging Technologies & Concepts for Cable Protection
Presentations should be 25 minutes long including time for questions and, to ensure clarity when presented, should be formatted in
accordance with the guidance that will be provided.
Prospective presenters are respectfully advised that papers that are overtly marketing a product or service will not be accepted, however
two marketing slides can be included at the beginning or end of the presentation.
NB: Commercial exhibits may be displayed adjacent to the ICPC meeting room by special arrangement. Please contact the Secretary for
further details.
Abstracts should be sent via email to [email protected] no later than 31 January 2009.
The EC will evaluate all submissions based on content and quality.
Florence By The Sea
36
A rare opportunity has emerged for
owners of trans-Pacific submarine cable intent
on landing on the West Coast of the United
States. A new cable landing station, on the
Oregon coast overlooking the Pacific Ocean,
is now open for business.
Located in Florence, Oregon, and owned
by Alaska Communications Systems (ACS,)
the landing station is a virtual turnkey operation
boasting an array of attractive features. The
facility is run by highly skilled staff in a state
that embraces the fiber optic cable industry; it
has an offshore marine environment conducive
to cable-laying; and it provides diverse and
robust backhaul transport to the major telecom
hubs of Portland and Seattle.
“It’s an ideal spot for landing a new
undersea cable,” said Laura Dana, ACS Senior
Washington’s largest cities.
The two landing stations are part of a
strong Enterprise focus by Anchorage-based
ACS, Alaska’s leading integrated telecom
provider. The company is rapidly evolving
from its past as an incumbent local exchange
carrier into an advanced telecom firm capable
of serving large commercial and government
clients, as well as other telecom carriers, with
rooftops in Alaska, the Lower 48 and beyond.
Over the last five years ACS has
worked to transform its network to better serve
the fast-growing Enterprise market and in 2007
it invested $175 million in long-haul undersea
fiber
optics. A key part of the
investment was
the
$105
million
By Paula Dobbyn
Manager, Carrier Sales &
Service.
In addition to the
Florence facility, ACS
recently acquired an
existing Oregon-based
cable landing station
in Nedonna Beach
through its purchase of
Crest Communications
Corp. and its subsidiary,
WCI Cable. Like the
Florence station, the
Nedonna facility also ties
in to dual path terrestrial
fiber routes interconnecting
with major telecommunications
infrastructure in Oregon and
construction of ACS’ own submarine cable, the
Alaska Oregon Network (AKORN.) With its four
fiber pairs, AKORN is a new, geographically
distinct fiber route between Anchorage and
Oregon. It is equipped with 40 Gigabits of
initial capacity and is designed to move 2.6
terabits of data per second. The new AKORN
cable system is scheduled to begin moving
commercial traffic in the first quarter of this
year.
ACS allocated $70 million toward the
purchase of WCI Cable and its existing Northstar
submarine cable system interconnecting
Anchorage, Valdez and Juneau, Alaska, with
Nedonna Beach, Hillsboro and Portland,
Oregon. With the AKORN and Northstar
cable systems, ACS now owns two of the four
undersea fiber cables between Alaska and
the Lower 48 states. In addition to the cable
systems and landing stations, ACS’ Lower
48 asset portfolio also includes a Network
37
Operations Control Center and remote data
hosting center in Hillsboro, Oregon, as well as
dual network operations centers in Anchorage
and Raleigh, North Carolina.
“The company is uniquely positioned
to serve the trans-Pacific fiber optic cable
industry,” Dana said.
Why Florence?
In the early stages of the AKORN
project, ACS hired experts to scour the coastline
of California, Oregon and Washington to find
the best location for a new, physically diverse
landing station. Several factors led ACS to
choose the seaside Oregon town of Florence.
“One of the biggest drivers was
availability of backhaul. Florence had existing
terrestrial cables connecting it to the big Pacific
Northwest hubs – Seattle and Portland –with
easy connections to Los Angeles and San
Francisco,” said Steve Gebert, ACS Program
Manager, who oversaw the AKORN build.
For trans-Pacific cable owners, this
means they can route their traffic through the
ACS landing station and on to major nodes
in Portland and Seattle, or in the opposite
direction – from the U.S. to Asia, and beyond.
ACS’ peering points in Portland and Seattle
connect to national and global telecom hubs.
The Florence facility has a beach manhole and
conduit back to the landing station that make it
ready for another cable, in addition to AKORN.
The land station also has an easement for
additional horizontal directional drilling.
Another key driver for choosing
Florence and why it makes a superb choice for
landing a cable is ease of permitting and good
relations with state government. Compared
to the neighboring states of California and
Washington, Oregon typically makes it less
difficult to land fiber optic cables on its shores.
Since issuing its first undersea cable permit in
1990, Oregon has developed a strong track
record for timely landing of new cables. In
2005, Oregon Gov. Theodore R. Kulongoski
declared his state “open for business” to cable
companies.
The state sponsored a booth at the
Pacific Telecom Conference in Honolulu that
year. Hawaii. In a welcome letter to delegates,
Kulongoski noted Oregon’s established
process for landing undersea cable on its coast
and assured them that all permit requests are
given “full and speedy consideration.” In fact,
Oregon provides a streamlined permit process
the sea bed is soft and the cable-burying
equipment does not have to negotiate hard
bottom conditions and steep slopes, the end
result is more dependable and less costly.
The AKORN cable from Alaska to
Oregon is fully buried from the Florence beach
manhole out to 700 fathoms of water depth
– a good indication of the seabed’s softness,
McMullen said.
38
with a 180-day turn-around. Some applications
have been issued in less than two months,
according to the state’s official web site.
“It’s clear that the state of Oregon
has taken the position that undersea cable
infrastructure is good for the state and is
welcome here,” said Scott McMullen, chairman
of the Oregon Fishermen’s Cable Committee.
McMullen’s organization is an association of
commercial trawl fishermen and cable owners
who have negotiated cooperative agreements
with the fiber optic cable companies to protect
the integrity of submarine cables transiting the
Oregon fishing grounds.
“Our job is to provide communication,
coordination and cooperation between the
fishing and the submarine cable industries so
that both and co-exist,” McMullen said.
The seabed that extends into the Pacific
Ocean from the Florence landing station is
mostly smooth and silty, making it relatively
easy to bury cable. It’s no small feat to plough
undersea cable into the ocean floor. But when
The Backhaul
ACS engaged LS Networks to tie the
Florence landing station into carrier hotels in
Portland and Seattle. Based in Portland, LS
Networks had an existing presence in Florence.
To accommodate ACS, the company extended
its existing fiber in Florence 12 miles to
the ACS landing station. LS
Network now provides ACS
with two diverse routes to
Pacific Northwest hubs
on its network.
“One
carries
traffic from Florence to
Portland and then meets
up with the ACS network.
Then I have another pair
of wavelengths that go
from Florence and bypass
Portland and connect with
the ACS network in Seattle.
We give them fully diverse
routing,” said Jim Bascom,
Director of Sales and
Marketing, for LS Networks.
In
Portland,
ACS
network traffic connects into
co-location facilities in the Pittock
Internet Exchange, one of the largest
telecommunications nodes in the United
States. In Seattle, ACS moves traffic
through the Westin Building, one of premier
carrier hotels in the Pacific Northwest.
Each of the terrestrial routes transports
two 10Gigabit wavelengths for a total capacity
of 40Gigabits with potential for capacity
upgrades.
ACS’ Nedonna Beach landing station
further up the Oregon coast also provides
diverse, redundant backhaul transport to
Portland and Seattle with connectivity to all
major carriers. In addition to housing the
Northstar system terminal equipment, the
Nedonna Beach landing station is a landing
point for other trans-Pacific cables in addition
to Northstar. But it has room for one more.
Fairbanks
Anchorage
Whittier
Nikiski
Homer
Valdez
Nedonna Beach
Juneau
Seattle
Portland
Hillsboro
Florence
From its Hillsboro facility, ACS provides
equipment operations and maintenance
to support existing trans-Pacific cables, as
well as cable duct and dark fiber backhaul
infrastructure to Portland.
39
Skills and Talent
It obviously takes much more than
state-of-the art equipment to keep voice
and data traffic moving under the ocean and
between continents. A highly skilled workforce
with years of industry experiences is another
vital ingredient. In addition to its Anchorage
workforce of some 1,000, ACS, through its
purchase of WCI Cable, inherited a seasoned
group of engineers and technicians with
extensive background operating cable landing
stations and supporting undersea cable
systems.
Jack Holland is Director of ACS Cable
Systems, the subsidiary that operates AKORN
and Northstar and the associated infrastructure.
Holland has more than 30 years of experience
supporting undersea cable systems for the
military and the private sector. He began his
career with the Air Force Eastern Test Range
Missile Project supporting its undersea cable
component. Holland later managed submarine
telecommunications in Southeast Alaska for
10 years and prior to joining ACS, he oversaw
operations for the Northstar cable for nearly a
decade.
Most of Holland’s staff has been with
him since the 1990s and they are highly skilled
in operating landing stations and undersea
cable networks. One of them is Anatoliy
Pavlenko, an electrical engineer by training.
“Our primary mission is to take care
of the landing stations. But of course we do
everything from maintaining and repairing the
equipment to support cable operators across
multiple time zones. We also support cable
ships that do repair work at sea,” Pavlenko
said.
“Cable ships are very expensive to
operate so you have to be able to efficiently
and effectively help those people do what they
do. It’s a wide range of skills you have to have,
and not just technical.”
Pavlenko, who worked for WCI Cable
for 10 years prior to joining ACS in the recent
acquisition, has received specialized training
at Alcatel-Lucent in France on two occasions.
“I’m really happy to be with ACS. It’s
a great company to work for and its new
investments in fiber optics are truly exciting,”
he said.
Paula Dobbyn is a former
print and broadcast journalist
who
directs
corporate
communications for Alaska
Communications Systems.
She is a longtime Alaskan.
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A global guide to the latest known locations of the world’s cableships*, as of January 2009. Information Provided by Lloyds List.
41
VESSEL NAME
ARRIVAL DATE
SAILED DATE
PORT NAME
COUNTRY NAME
Acergy Discovery
11/9/2008
11/12/2008
Esbjerg
Denmark
Acergy Discovery
11/15/2008
11/17/2008
Esbjerg
Denmark
Acergy Discovery
11/21/2008
11/22/2008
Esbjerg
Denmark
Acergy Discovery
12/10/2008
12/10/2008
Esbjerg
Denmark
Acergy Discovery
12/16/2008
12/16/2008
Esbjerg
Denmark
Acergy Discovery
12/23/2008
Dundee
United Kingdom
Asean Restorer
11/8/2008
11/13/2008
Pasir Gudang
Malaysia
Asean Restorer
11/13/2008
11/18/2008
Singapore
Republic of Singapore
12/12/2008
Asean Restorer
11/28/2008
Asean Restorer
12/19/2008
Atlantic Guardian
11/7/2008
11/7/2008
Singapore
Singapore
Valletta
Malta
Atlantic Guardian
11/15/2008
11/15/2008
Suez
Arab Republic of Egypt
Atlantic Guardian
12/9/2008
12/10/2008
Singapore
C.S.Sovereign
11/10/2008
11/10/2008
Rosyth
United Kingdom
C.S.Sovereign
12/9/2008
12/9/2008
Dover Strait
United Kingdom
C.S.Sovereign
12/10/2008
12/12/2008
Portland(GBR)
United Kingdom
C.S.Sovereign
12/12/2008
Portland(GBR)
United Kingdom
Cable Innovator
11/6/2008
Singapore
Cable Protector
11/29/2008
Singapore
Cable Retriever
12/6/2008
Hong Kong
People’s Republic of China
Chamarel
11/24/2008
11/28/2008
Cape Town
South Africa
12/24/2008
Chamarel
12/2/2008
Chamarel
12/24/2008
CS Fu Hai
12/10/2008
11/7/2008
12/14/2008
Walvis Bay
Republic of Namibia
Cape Town
South Africa
Hong Kong
42
VESSEL NAME
ARRIVAL DATE
CS Fu Hai
12/18/2008
DP Reel
11/23/2008
DP Reel
11/18/2008
SAILED DATE
PORT NAME
COUNTRY NAME
12/22/2008
Hong Kong
11/23/2008
Marsaxlokk
Malta
11/23/2008
Marsaxlokk
Malta
DP Reel
12/15/2008
12/16/2008
Douala
Cameroon
Elektron II
11/7/2008
11/7/2008
Skaw
Denmark
Elektron II
11/6/2008
11/7/2008
Drammen
Norway
Elektron II
11/14/2008
11/16/2008
Drammen
Norway
Elektron II
11/19/2008
11/19/2008
Tyne
United Kingdom
Elektron II
11/24/2008
11/25/2008
Invergordon
United Kingdom
Elektron II
12/8/2008
12/8/2008
Skaw
Denmark
Elektron II
12/3/2008
12/8/2008
Drammen
Norway
Elektron II
12/13/2008
12/13/2008
Skaw
Denmark
12/23/2008
Emerald Sea
12/13/2008
Fender Care 2
12/16/2008
Singapore
Apapa-Lagos
Nigeria
Fjordkabel
11/11/2008
11/11/2008
Harstad
Norway
Fjordkabel
11/26/2008
11/29/2008
Harstad
Norway
12/4/2008
Fjordkabel
12/3/2008
Harstad
Norway
Geo Challenger
1/4/2009
Valletta
Malta
Geowave Commander
12/4/2008
Mumbai
India
Geowave Master
11/6/2008
Walvis Bay
Republic of Namibia
Global Sentinel
11/17/2008
11/24/2008
Portland(OR USA)
United States of America
Global Sentinel
11/24/2008
12/31/2008
Portland(OR USA)
Gulmar Badaro
11/18/2008
11/18/2008
Ravenna
Italy
Gulmar Badaro
11/17/2008
11/18/2008
Ravenna
Italy
Ile de Batz
11/17/2008
11/22/2008
Portland(OR USA)
Ile de Batz
12/11/2008
12/11/2008
Panama Canal
Panama
Ile de Brehat
11/8/2008
11/11/2008
Brest
France
Ile de Brehat
11/16/2008
11/21/2008
Brest
France
Ile de Brehat
11/21/2008
11/26/2008
Brest
France
Ile de Brehat
11/27/2008
11/27/2008
Portland(GBR)
United Kingdom
Ile de Brehat
12/2/2008
12/2/2008
Dover Strait
United Kingdom
Ile de Brehat
12/3/2008
Brest
France
Ile de Sein
11/8/2008
11/14/2008
Halifax
Canada
Ile de Sein
11/24/2008
12/16/2008
Calais
France
Ile de Sein
12/16/2008
12/17/2008
Everingen
Netherlands
Ile de Sein
12/17/2008
12/17/2008
Dover Strait
United Kingdom
43
VESSEL NAME
ARRIVAL DATE
SAILED DATE
PORT NAME
COUNTRY NAME
Ile de Sein
12/17/2008
Calais
France
IT Interceptor
11/7/2008
11/14/2008
Falmouth
United Kingdom
IT Interceptor
11/19/2008
11/21/2008
Las Palmas
Canary Islands
IT Interceptor
12/27/2008
12/29/2008
Dakar
Senegal
IT Intrepid
11/5/2008
11/5/2008
San Francisco
IT Intrepid
11/12/2008
11/15/2008
San Francisco
IT Intrepid
12/8/2008
12/8/2008
Panama Canal
Panama
IT Intrepid
12/28/2008
1/2/2009
Halifax
Canada
KDD Pacific Link
12/4/2008
12/5/2008
Kitakyushu
Japan
KDD Pacific Link
12/15/2008
12/25/2008
Kitakyushu
Japan
KDD Pacific Link
12/28/2008
12/29/2008
Yokohama
Japan
KDDI Ocean Link
11/25/2008
12/19/2008
Yokohama
Japan
Leon Thevenin
11/7/2008
11/11/2008
Brest
France
Leon Thevenin
11/15/2008
1/2/2009
Brest
France
Leon Thevenin
1/3/2009
1/3/2009
Dover Strait
United Kingdom
Lodbrog
11/17/2008
11/22/2008
Keelung
Taiwan
Lodbrog
11/26/2008
11/30/2008
Keelung
Taiwan
Lodbrog
12/3/2008
12/6/2008
Shanghai
Lodbrog
12/16/2008
12/18/2008
Shanghai
12/22/2008
Lodbrog
12/20/2008
Maersk Recorder
11/10/2008
Maersk Responder
11/17/2008
Shanghai
Shenzhen
11/17/2008
Valletta
Malta
Maersk Responder
12/12/2008
12/16/2008
Catania
Italy
Manta III
11/20/2008
11/20/2008
Suez
Arab Republic of Egypt
Nexans Skagerrak
11/17/2008
11/17/2008
Kisarazu
Japan
Nexans Skagerrak
11/15/2008
11/17/2008
Kisarazu
Japan
Nexans Skagerrak
11/17/2008
11/20/2008
Kisarazu
Japan
Nexans Skagerrak
11/29/2008
12/1/2008
Hong Kong
Nexans Skagerrak
12/1/2008
12/16/2008
Nexans Skagerrak
12/16/2008
Niwa
12/17/2008
Haikou
Hong Kong
12/19/2008
Fujairah Anch.
United Arab Emirates
Normand Cutter
11/9/2008
11/9/2008
Dover Strait
United Kingdom
Normand Cutter
11/14/2008
11/14/2008
Gibraltar
Gibraltar
Normand Cutter
11/18/2008
11/18/2008
Messina Strait
Italy
Normand Cutter
12/4/2008
12/4/2008
Brindisi
Italy
Normand Cutter
12/10/2008
12/10/2008
Brindisi
Italy
VESSEL NAME
44
ARRIVAL DATE
SAILED DATE
PORT NAME
COUNTRY NAME
Normand Cutter
12/13/2008
12/13/2008
Brindisi
Italy
Normand Cutter
12/16/2008
12/16/2008
Brindisi
Italy
Normand Cutter
12/19/2008
12/19/2008
Brindisi
Italy
Normand Cutter
12/19/2008
12/23/2008
Cagliari
Italy
Normand Cutter
12/23/2008
12/23/2008
Trapani
Italy
Normand Cutter
12/28/2008
12/29/2008
Marsaxlokk
Malta
Pacific Guardian
11/10/2008
12/10/2008
Tampa
Pacific Guardian
12/22/2008
12/28/2008
Bermuda
Bermuda
Pacific Guardian
1/2/2009
Curacao
Netherlands Antilles
Peace in Africa
12/7/2008
Saldanha Bay
South Africa
Peter Faber
12/3/2008
12/5/2008
Vigo
Spain
Peter Faber
12/20/2008
12/20/2008
Malta
Malta
Peter Faber
12/11/2008
12/20/2008
Valletta
Malta
Peter Faber
12/30/2008
12/30/2008
Valletta
Malta
Pleijel
11/29/2008
Kalmar
Sweden
Raymond Croze
11/10/2008
Algeciras
Spain
11/10/2008
Raymond Croze
11/10/2008
11/27/2008
Toulon
France
Raymond Croze
11/27/2008
11/27/2008
Gibraltar
Gibraltar
Raymond Croze
11/27/2008
11/28/2008
Algeciras
Spain
Raymond Croze
12/2/2008
12/2/2008
Algeciras
Spain
Raymond Croze
12/27/2008
12/27/2008
Catania
Italy
Rene Descartes
12/27/2008
12/28/2008
Singapore
Rubicon Maverick
12/29/2008
Singapore
Salma
11/17/2008
11/17/2008
Las Palmas
Canary Islands
Salma
11/22/2008
11/25/2008
Setubal
Portugal
Salma
11/29/2008
11/29/2008
Las Palmas
Canary Islands
Salma
12/4/2008
12/5/2008
St. Vincent(CPV)
Republic of Cape Verde
Salma
12/14/2008
12/14/2008
Las Palmas
Canary Islands
12/31/2008
Salma
12/31/2008
Sarku Santubong
12/1/2008
SD Newton
11/7/2008
Ceuta
Spain
Singapore
11/10/2008
Santa Cruz de Tenerife
Canary Islands
SD Newton
12/1/2008
12/11/2008
Portland(GBR)
United Kingdom
Seamec Princess
12/11/2008
12/14/2008
Sharjah
United Arab Emirates
Segero
12/9/2008
12/9/2008
Singapore
Segero
12/4/2008
12/9/2008
Singapore
Setouchi Surveyor
11/12/2008
11/15/2008
Singapore
VESSEL NAME
45
ARRIVAL DATE
SAILED DATE
PORT NAME
COUNTRY NAME
Setouchi Surveyor
11/15/2008
Singapore
Skandi Neptune
12/11/2008
12/11/2008
U.S. Gulf
Skandi Neptune
12/11/2008
12/11/2008
Mobile
Skandi Neptune
11/26/2008
12/11/2008
Mobile
Subaru
11/19/2008
11/19/2008
Nagasaki
Japan
Team Oman
12/4/2008
12/5/2008
Wilhelmshaven
Germany
Team Oman
12/11/2008
12/22/2008
Dundee
United Kingdom
Team Oman
12/24/2008
12/29/2008
Wilhelmshaven
Germany
Team Oman
12/30/2008
Wilhelmshaven
Germany
Teliri
11/6/2008
11/19/2008
Catania
Italy
Teliri
11/19/2008
11/19/2008
Augusta
Italy
Teliri
11/20/2008
11/21/2008
Valletta
Malta
Teliri
12/22/2008
12/23/2008
Catania
Italy
Teliri
12/30/2008
12/31/2008
Augusta
Italy
Texas
12/4/2008
12/4/2008
Messina Strait
Italy
Texas
12/5/2008
12/11/2008
Marsaxlokk
Malta
Texas
12/11/2008
Marsaxlokk
Malta
Tyco Decisive
12/25/2008
12/31/2008
Baltimore
Tyco Dependable
11/20/2008
12/4/2008
Lerwick
United Kingdom
Tyco Dependable
12/4/2008
Baltimore
Tyco Durable
11/17/2008
12/14/2008
Keelung
Taiwan
Tyco Resolute
11/7/2008
12/8/2008
Portsmouth(NH USA)
Tyco Resolute
12/8/2008
12/12/2008
Baltimore
Tyco Responder
12/9/2008
12/9/2008
Guaranao Bay
Venezuela
Tyco Responder
12/9/2008
Curacao
Netherlands Antilles
Wartena
11/17/2008
11/18/2008
Kalmar
Sweden
Wartena
11/24/2008
11/25/2008
Kalmar
Sweden
Wave Sentinel
11/5/2008
11/5/2008
Dover Strait
United Kingdom
Wave Sentinel
11/6/2008
11/25/2008
Portland(GBR)
United Kingdom
Wave Sentinel
11/30/2008
11/30/2008
Gibraltar
Gibraltar
Wave Sentinel
11/30/2008
12/5/2008
Portland(GBR)
United Kingdom
Wave Sentinel
12/5/2008
12/6/2008
Gibraltar
Gibraltar
Wave Sentinel
12/10/2008
12/11/2008
Portland(GBR)
United Kingdom
Wave Sentinel
12/24/2008
Portland(GBR)
United Kingdom
Wave Venture
12/1/2008
Shanghai
Letter to a friend
from Jean Devos
My dear friend,
My friend, like most of the readers of my letter,
you probably do not remember Robert Jocteur.
This name does not ring a bell, but stay with me,
since you most likely have “your” Jocteur in your
own environment.
It is only when I tried to send Robert Jocteur
“Botany Bay”
my Christmas message last month that I was
at discovering
that he novel,
had passed
away
Istunned
published
recently a modest
whose
title
last
September!
And
I
hadn’t
been
made
aware
of
is Botany Bay. It is the place in Australia where
it! How is that possible that such a man leaves us
Alcatel established a
without any noise?
submarine cable facSince we had both retired from the submarine
in 1989
as partofof
cable activity we used to tory
exchange
a couple
its contract
for old
the
emails each year, pursuing this
way a 40 year
Tasman
link. In
this
dialog and complicity. Among
all the2 people
from
the Alcatel group I had worked
with,
he was
the one
same
bay,
where
two
I felt the closest, with whichcenturies
I had morebefore
affinities.
the
He was my technical teacher,
my
technology
French expedition
adviser when I was bringing the market trend and
“La Pérouse” made of
competition status to him!
La Boussole
We have both served two
ourships,
company
with
dedication and loyalty during 40 years, but our top
management was a bit nervous to perceive that we
were “somewhere else”. Our priority, our “religion,”
our belonging, was the submarine cable community.
For Jocteur it was also the scientific community.
He was a free man, an intellectual, a scientist, an
academic, a wise man. He was “at home” in the
My Dear Friend
46
Laboratories, in the R&D environment. Meeting
with him was for me fresh air, an opening toward the
future. He had the gentleness of the strong people,
and
l’Astrolabe,
1788 tocoming
discover
that
the
ones
who have landed
a naturalinauthority
from
Captain
Cook was
around the
bearing
their
competency,
theiralready
vision, without
need tothe
British
Baytheir
is now
raise
theirflag.
voiceSoorBotany
to remind
statusfororme
theirthe
position
hierarchy.
was observing
the
symbolinofthe
a dream
whichHebecomes
a reality!
highly paid
“managers”,
and
their
behavior
with
Tasman 2 has been yet another chapter
aninamusing
smile.
He knew that
creative people
this long
Anglo-French
competition!
The
like him will always be treated like “travelling
award to Alcatel came out as a big surprise to
acrobats”.
many, including inside Alcatel. Everybody was
He was born in Lyon, the second main French
naturally
expecting
British
tomind.
win that
battown,
but the
second ofthe
none
in his
When
tle,Alcatel
and such
expectation
was at
that
time
the
Cableanheadquarters
moved
from
Lyon
tovery
Parislogical.
area, Jocteur decided that he would never
leave Lyon!
Andwere
so heso
did!many difficulties and
There
Alcatel
should
raise
memorial toAustralia
him, because
misunderstandinga between
and
itFrance,
is reallythe
thanks
to
a
handful
of
persons
including
main one being the French presence
him that Alcatel managed to participate in TAT 8,
in the Pacific area, the worse being the nuclear
the very first long haul optical system. The decision
experiment
in Tahiti! The
sadoccasion
Rainbow
tobomb
introduce
the new technology
at this
was taken by ATT! Quite a surprise and a challenge
for Alcatel! ATT /Bell Labs were at least a year in
advance in terms of technology development, and
ATT was determined to build TAT 8 by itself and
take advantage on the market. I’m not sure ASN
would have survived with an absence in TAT 8 or a
failure on this highly visible and qualifying program.
Warrior event was still in everyone’s memory. It
is for these reasons among others that STC (UK)
rejected the Alcatel‘s suggestion to come with a
joint bid, to offer a “European” solution.
One of the winning factors has been the
Port-Botany cable factory. Such a factory was a
strong requirement from OTC (now Telstra) and
the Australian Government.
Alcatel was the most motivated. Such a
factory could expand its influence in the Pacific
where the three other players were historically
well established in this region, which represents
a large part of their market. They saw this
factory as a risk for their existing facilities!
Jocteur has been the true leader in terms of fiber and
SubOptic ‘87 in Versailles came at the right time.
cable design! He drove the development program,
It is where the Australian teams discovered the
including
two experimental links: Cannes-Juan les
French
a close cooperation
between
Pins
(20kmmodel,
1982), Antibes-Port
Grimaud (80km
Alcatel
exactly what
wanted
to es1984),
and and
a firstFT,
commercial
link they
in 1987
between
tablish in
country.
Marseilles
andtheir
Ajaccio
(400Km). TAT 8 came to
life in 1988.
It
was
a
2
fibers
system, 280
Mb,but
My friend, things pairs
are changed
since,
single
channel
per
fiber,
with
a
sophisticated
BU
one thing stays true: When you offer something,
splitting
the traffic between UK and France!! 20
the reader can see between the lines if you are
years ago!
or not genuinely motivated and sincere. Then
I sincerely hope that the submarine players of
your
offerthem
becomes
really
attractive
and this
today, among
the ones
attending
PTC, realize
opens
the
route
to
“Botany
Bay.”
the merits of these pioneers who brought this new
My brother
in arms
technology to life and then to maturity. Since then
the technology
continuously evolved, and
See you has
soon.
Jocteur was convinced that science and technology
are fundamental to the progress of humanity.
I have now lost my brother in arms. We had the
Submarcom Consulting
same fights.
Jean Devos
Jean Devos
4
47
Conference
Date
Venue
www
Pacific Telecoms
Conference 2009
18-21 January 2009
Honolulu, Hawaii USA
www.ptc.org
International Cable
Protection Committee 2009
21-23 April 2009
Florida USA
www.iscpc.org
Energy
Telecommunications and
Electrical Association 2009
April 29 - May 1, 2009
Houston, Texas USA
www.entelec.org
Subsea Communications
Conference 2009
6-8 May 2009
Macau, PRC
www.subseacommunications.com
SubOptic 2010
11-14 May 2010
Yokohama, Japan
www.suboptic.org

Issue 42 - Submarine Telecoms Forum

Transcription

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