• International submarine system to be Ready-for-Service by second half of 2016

Singapore, 22 September, 2014 - Construction of the new Southeast Asia-Middle East- Western Europe (SEA-ME-WE 5) submarine cable system has started and the 20,000- kilometre system is expected to be Ready-for-Service by the second half of 2016.

Devised with the latest 100Gbps technology and with a design capacity of at least 24 Terabytes per second on 3-fibre pairs, SEA-ME-WE 5 is a multi-regional superhighway that will provide the lowest latency and represent an additional network layer of diversity and resilience for the heavily loaded Asia to Europe route.

Mr Ooi Seng Keat, Vice President, Carrier Services, SingTel Group Enterprise said: "The construction of the SEA-ME-WE 5 submarine cable is a massive technological undertaking which marks a global communications milestone.

"By accelerating the flow of voice, video and data traffic, this new generation data superhighway will facilitate the delivery of broadband-heavy applications, video and contents to enterprises and consumers in Europe, the Middle East and Southeast Asia.

"With its completion in 2016, we will further enhance our global network and reinforce our position as the leading provider of international data services in the region."

SEA-ME-WE 5 will connect 17 countries from Singapore to Europe (Italy and France). It covers Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan, Oman, UAE, Yemen, Djibouti, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

The SEA-ME-WE 5 consortium comprises 14 global players.  They include Bangladesh Submarine Cable Company Limited (BSCCL), China Mobile International Limited (CMI), China Telecom Global Limited (CTG), China United Network Communications Group Company Limited (China Unicom), Djibouti Telecom SA (Djibouti Telecom), Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company (du), Orange, Myanmar Post and Telecom (MPT), PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia International (Telin), Saudi Telecom Company (STC), Singapore Telecommunications Limited (SingTel), Sri Lanka Telecom PLC (SLT), Telekom Malaysia Berhad (TM), Telecom Italia Sparkle (TIS).

The contractors for the submarine cable system are Alcatel Submarine Networks and NEC.

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