Southern Cross Cables has announced the launch of its NEXT cable. As stated, the is the world's first single-span 400GbE service over the submarine network. This service is tested on a network of 15.840 km between Sydney, Auckland and Los Angeles.
As part of the NEXT start-up processes, Southern Cross partners with Ciena to launch and test error-free services. The cable will enable reliable connectivity between people and communities in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands with the rest of the world.
Besides, will provide the first international submarine fiber connections a North y Kiribati. This will reinforce Fiji's growing role as a digital hub for Pacific Islands.
The cable has taken just over two years to complete. It will be the third link in the Southern Cross network system between Australasia and the USA. The communication cable NEXT will increase system capacity by approximately 500%, until reaching some 100 Tbps. This means doubling the capacity of direct international connections between Australia and New Zealand and the US.
The Southern Cross communications system consists of three different submarine cable routes. It has more than 20 access points with a total length of more than 43.000 kilometres. These lines will enable high-capacity, low-latency connectivity between Australia, New Zealand, Better, Tokelau Islands, Kiribati, Hawaii and the West Coast of the United States.
Southern Cross claims that this underwater network system is capable of transmitting about 10.000 million Facebook photos in just over 300 seconds.
Southern Cross NEXT is based on Ciena GeoMesh Extreme and uses coherent optical technology WaveLogic 5 Extreme (Wl5e) to connect the new system to Southern Cross' current network architecture. This technology can help reduce energy costs and inefficiencies by more than one 600% for each bit.
Laurie Miller, director general de Southern Cross Cable Network, says new technology is designed to support growing demand for hyperscale bandwidth driven by cloud applications and digitalization. It is also designed to meet the changing needs of the company's customers and industry..