The 7,200km projects uses 40Gbps technology with the potential to upgrade to 100Gbps in the future, and has a minimum design capacity of 15 Terabits.
PLDT expects the project to enhance the Philippines’ global competiveness and attract investments for business process outsourcing industries. The carrier also intends to expand its broadband services through the cable with bandwidth heavy applications such as IP-based data, external video content other external multimedia services.
“This is the largest-capacity international submarine cable system ever to land in the Philippines,” said PLDT President and CEO Napoleon Nazareno, also adding that ASE “significantly raises the resiliency of the country’s international communications links”.
Although the system is initially planned to link Japan, the Philippines, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore there is also the potential to expand to other Asian countries like Vietnam, Indonesia and China, according to PLDT.
ASE lands in the Philippines via a landing station at Daet, Camarines Norte and is claimed to be the first and only direct connection between the Philippines and Japan, avoiding earthquake prone areas taken by other cables south of Taiwan.
PLDT has invested $55 million in the project with other consortium members including NTT Communications of Japan, StarHub of Singapore and TM of Malaysia making up the remainder. The cable for the project was supplied by NEC Corp and Fujitsu.
