Southern Cross NEXT Cable Making Pacific Connections

Southern Cross Cable Network is helping the Pacific community achieve its connectivity vision with signed interest in the Southern Cross NEXT system now confirmed with four Pacific Island operators, and discussions with several other large-scale customers underway.

The initial Southern Cross NEXT build will be a high capacity express route, providing data-center connectivity between Sydney, Auckland, and Los Angeles, and is on target for completion during 2019. The system is planned to have an initial capacity of more than 60 terabits, adding to the existing 20 Terabit capability of the current Southern Cross systems. Given its design and route, it will be the lowest latency path to the United States by some considerable margin and will provide immediate benefit to customers with additional route diversity.

Southern Cross Cables President and CEO, Anthony Briscoe, said, “Given both Southern Cross’ and my personal history in supporting telecommunications connectivity in the Pacific, it is very gratifying that we have the potential to help further boost island economic growth through cable connectivity to support the vision of the Pacific community. Their commitment to the project and support of the solution proposed is strong enough that financial commitment has been achieved for the marine surveys to be committed to in all the interested party jurisdictions.”

“We continue to have talks with several Pacific Island representatives, and while Southern Cross is not looking to specifically build a new system interconnecting the Pacific Islands, we remain committed to discussion on how we can assist in facilitating the onward connectivity of systems from the islands to the rest of the world in a convenient and cost-effective way, where it is practical to do so and does not impact the progress of the Southern Cross NEXT project. The Tui-Samoa project and recent Manatua announcement are excellent examples of the Pacific community working together, and Southern Cross remains committed to ensuring that any onward connectivity via the existing and Southern Cross NEXT systems helps support and underpin the telecommunications vision of those communities.”

Dean Veverka, Vice President Networks for Southern Cross Cables, said, “With approximately 45 percent of the 12,500km route between Sydney and Los Angeles now surveyed, we continue to undertake route refinements and optimizations to minimize overall route length and latency while navigating around sea-floor obstacles and unstable terrain.”

“For these four nations, this project increases their ability to stay connected in a world that relies on connectivity by linking them into a larger network, thereby facilitating them to stay always on despite their remote locations. Yet perhaps of greater importance is the new wave of capacity and speed that will be available to them which puts each nation arguably on par with their bigger route partners when it comes to bandwidth availability, speed, and latency.”