Carriers Fund Sea-Me-We 4 Cable

SINGAPORE -- Singapore Telecommunications Limited (SingTel) and 15 other international telecommunications carriers have signed an agreement to construct a new submarine cable linking South East Asia, the Middle East and Western Europe. Alcatel Submarine Networks and Fujitsu have been jointly awarded the contract to implement this project, estimated to cost US$500 million.

The South East Asia-Middle East-Western Europe 4 (SEA-ME-WE 4) cable system will span some 20,000 km across the world to achieve ultra fast terabit per second connectivity. It will land in 14 countries – Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Italy, Tunisia, Algeria and France.

Expected to be ready for service in the third quarter of 2005, the SEA-ME-WE 4 system will carry telephone, Internet and various broadband data streams, benefiting millions of people from Singapore all the way to France. It will be a timely response to bandwidth demand in these regions as parallel networks, such as SEA-ME-WE 3, are approaching their maximum design capacity.

Utilising Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) technology with Synchronous Digital Hierarchy (SDH) transmission, the SEA-ME-WE 4 system will be among the most economical cable systems in the region offering unparalleled enhanced network resilience and connectivity.

SingTel’s investment in this project will be up to US$40 million.

SingaporeTelecommunications Ltd. (SingTel)