Subsea connectivity boost for Latin America

Details: Vaughan O'Grady; Category: Optical & Fixed Networks; 29 October 2019; 6101 views

The EllaLink Group and Telxius have signed a collaboration agreement for international subsea capacity and terrestrial connectivity in Latin America, including cable landing facilities in Fortaleza, Brazil.

EllaLink is the express subsea cable system between Europe and Latin America. Telxius is the telecommunication infrastructure company of the Telefónica Group.

The complementary infrastructure owned by EllaLink and Telxius will, the partners say, enable European traffic to reach Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo and other key cities in Brazil and across Latin America.

Already under construction, EllaLink is an open state-of-the-art four fibre pair submarine cable system designed to satisfy the growing demand for traffic between Europe and Latin America.

The system will, says the EllaLink Group, offer the first-ever direct fibre route between the two regions, thus avoiding the traffic congestion of the North Atlantic and offering the lowest latency when compared to existing routes. By offering route diversity to all existing cable systems, EllaLink will provide a uniquely secured traffic protection route between Europe and Latin America.

Rafael Arranz, chief operating officer of Telxius for its cable business, points out that the collaboration will leverage the extensive Telxius subsea cable network and its terrestrial extensions across Latin America. “In particular,” he adds, “Telxius’ Fortaleza cable landing station interconnects subsea cables stretching towards three continents: America (Central and North), Africa and Europe (with EllaLink). Telxius’ BRUSA [a high capacity system] with its 138 Tbps, is currently the highest-capacity and lowest-latency subsea cable connecting the Americas, potentially extending EllaLink’s reach, and ability to serve its customers, even further.”