Google funds $300M cable to connect US and Japan
If you think the most widely used search engine in the world Google can’t grow any bigger, grab a seat before you keep reading. Google…
Google to build underwater cable network from U.S. to Japan for Faster Internet.(Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
If you think the most widely used search engine in the world Google can’t grow any bigger, grab a seat before you keep reading.
Google is pouring $ 300 million in Faster, a transoceanic optic fiber cable that will connect U.S. West Coast with the cities of Shikura and Shima in Japan.
While the overall broadband capability is not predicted to improve dramatically nationwide, U.S. could slightly improve its place 14 in the industrialized countries index of quality of Internet connectivity.
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However, users in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Portland will have much more access to information to and from Asia at a much faster speed according to Vicente Pimienta, who has been a provider and consultant of Internet services since 1996. He thinks that online transactions will increase exponentially between the two geographical regions.
Google is anticipating this and needs to upgrade its broadband capacity.
Google hopes undersea cable will help meet surging internet use. ( Shutterstock)
In four years, the more than 200 underwater cables around the globe are expected to carry 132 billion gigabytes opposed to the 51 billion gigabytes reported in 2013 according to Builtvisible.
Googles YouTube alone uploads thousands of hours of video in Asia daily, not to mention more than a billion Android users connected to the same platform in the region.
Thats why we are investing in Faster, a new undersea cable that will connect major West Coast cities in the US to two coastal locations in Japan with a design capacity of 60 Tb/s (thats about ten million times faster than your cable modem), said Urs Hölzle senior vice president of technical infrastructure for Google.
Fasters 60 terabits per second outperforms Unitys 3.3 terabits per second that connects US to Japan and SJCs 28 terabits per second which connects seven countries in Asia. Google built both in 2008 and 2011 respectively.
Faster beats also Facebooks Asian Pacific Gateway, a 54.8 Tb/s cable that cost the social network $ 450 million in 2012.
But, for Pimienta the connectivity speed is not the most important implication of Faster. For him, the most important thing is that Google is also becoming an Internet services provider. This is a reaction to the fact that mobile devices companies are slowing down the use of Google services [specially YouTube] with the purpose of charging for faster use in the future Pimienta said.
This is part of a much bigger plan that includes satellite Internet transmission by Google, Pimienta said.
Faster is happening extremely fast as NEC, the technology infrastructure company contracted for the job announced last Tuesday that the project execution would begin immediately.
A consortium of tech firms that includes China Mobile International, China Telecom, China Telecom Global, TIME Dotcom Bhds Global Transit, KDDI Corp, and Singapore Telecommunications Ltd accompany Google in the funding of this endeavor.
The 124,000 miles-long Faster is expected to be ready for service in the second quarter of 2016.
Even though Asia is a more important market right now, I think there are more cables coming in the future to Europe and South America, Pimienta said.
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