Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad (ICE), the Costa Rican government-run electricity and telecommunications services provider, has announced that it will boost its current international capacity 23-fold through the integration of the Trans Americas Fiber Systems submarine cable TAM-1.
TAM-1 is due to start commercial operation in the fourth quarter of 2025. It will travel 7,000 kilometres along the Atlantic coast, from the United States to South America.
The BNamericas news service says this will include landing points in Colombia, the northern Caribbean (Puerto Rico, US Virgin Islands and British Virgin Islands), Mexico, and Central America (Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica and Panama). In Costa Rica the cable will strengthen the country’s connection with one of the largest data centres in the world: the Network Access Point (NAP) of the Americas in Miami.
TAM-1 will handle high data capacities, with an infrastructure of 24 pairs of optical fibre. In this way, kölbi (the brand name under which ICE offers its services) says it will be able to scale up to 18 terabits per second (or more if necessary), helping it to meet demand for services such as streaming, artificial intelligence, virtual reality and 5G.
It will also be able to reduce latency for real-time applications such as video calls, games and financial trading operations.
As ICE points out, this will encourages foreign investment, the development of local data centres and the growth of technology companies and cloud service platforms.
Leda Acevedo, ICE's Telecommunications Manager, says: "TAM-1 integrates state-of-the-art technologies, allows updates without physical interventions, improves operational efficiency and diversifies international connectivity routes. We will reduce costs, improve the quality and performance of services and offer more competitive prices."
We reported the start of TAM-1 construction two years ago, when the companies collaborating on the project included Xtera, AT&T, Arnos Telecommunication Services, EGS survey, and Julian Rawle Consulting.
