Facebook, Google plan new cable

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Facebook said on Monday that it planned two new underage cables to connect Singapore, Indonesia and North America in a project with Google and regional telecommunications companies to boost Internet connection capacity between regions.

The Facebook Investment of Network Investment, Kevin said, “Named Echo and Bifrost, they will be the first two cables to go through a new diversified route crossing the Java Sea and they will increase the total sub-capacity in the Trans-Pacific.” Salvadori, told Reuters.

He declined to specify the size of the investment, but said it was “a very material investment for us in Southeast Asia.”

Cable, according to the executive, will be the first to directly connect North America in some main parts of Indonesia, and will increase connectivity to the central and eastern provinces of the world’s fourth most populous country.

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Salvadori said that “Echo” is being built in partnership with Alphabet’s Google and Indonesian telecommunications company XL Aziata and should be completed by 2023.

Bifrost, which is being done in partnership with Telmine, a subsidiary of Telkom, Indonesia, and the Singaporean Group’s Keppel is scheduled to be completed by 2024.

The two cables, which will require regulatory approval, follow previous investments by Facebook to build connectivity in Indonesia, one of the top five markets globally.

According to a 2020 survey by the Indonesia Internet Providers Association, 73% of Indonesia’s 270 million population are online, while the majority use web data with less than 10 percent using a broadband connection. The country’s swaths remain without any internet access. Facebook said that last year it would deploy 3,000 km (1,8641 mi) of fiber to Indonesia in twenty cities, in addition to a previous deal to develop a public Wi-Fi hot spot.

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Salvadori said that in addition to Southeast Asian cables, Facebook was continuing with its broader sub-plan with the Pacific Light Cable Network (PLCN) in Asia and globally.

“We are working with partners and regulators to address all those concerns, and we are waiting for that cable to be a valuable, productive transpacific cable,” he said.

The 12,800-kilometer PLCN, which is being funded by Facebook and Alphabet, met the US government’s resistance to Hong Kong’s conduit plans. It was originally intended to connect the United States, Taiwan, Hong Kong and the Philippines. Facebook said that earlier this month it would abandon efforts to connect cable between California and Hong Kong due to “ongoing concerns from the US government about direct communication links between the United States and Hong Kong”.