The agreement, which was signed during SubOptic 2019, for the H2 system is the first to connect Australia and Hong Kong with direct access to China. In addition, the system has also been designed to allow for a number of branch units to locations such as Taiwan, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Island, Guam, Queensland, Hawaii and Los Angeles.
“We are pleased to partner with SubCom and are confident their superior technology and operational excellence will enable a smooth system deployment,” said Georges Krebs, CEO of H2. “H2 will bring the necessary boost in connectivity to Australia, which has one of the fastest-growing international traffic stream in the world.”
Once live the new system will offer the lowest latency from Australia across the Pacific Ocean, with the Sydney to Hong Kong branch delivering 15Tbps per fibre pair while the Sydney to Los Angeles branch carry’s more than 12.9TBps per fibre pair.
“Growing capacity requirements and new traffic patterns emerging within the Asia-Pacific region require the deployment of innovative and versatile submarine infrastructures,” said Remi Galasso, chairman of H2. “The H2 cable, with its North and East segments, has been designed to deliver direct connectivity through new subsea paths and provide optimal diversity. We are excited to be at the forefront of this development.”
The H2 North segment (Sydney - Hong Kong) is approximately 9,300km and the East segment is close to 13,000km, and both segments have single-end power feeding capability.. In addition, the branch between Sydney and Los Angeles will follow an entirely diverse route to the north of New Caledonia, which has not been used by any other cable.
“The opportunity to create a partnership with H2 and our experience in Australia is of great importance to us,” said Mike Rieger, vice president of global sales and marketing at SubCom. “We look forward to providing added connectivity to the Australasian region through the development of the H2 cable.”