More great news for PTCL and foreign investment into Pakistan. :k:
PTCL to sign deal for second undersea cable
Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL), along with 12 other telecom firms, is signing a US$500 million contract with a French and Japanese firm tomorrow (Sunday) to lay a new undersea fibre link cable that would connect South East Asia, Middle East and Western Europe. The consortium of 13 global telecom companies agreed to contract with Alcatel of France and Japan’s Fujitsu for the project - initially envisaged in May 2002, a top PTCL official confirmed. “All the 13 (telecom) companies agreed to hire Alcatel and Fujitsu as they were the lowest bidders,” said the official. He said the consortium had sought offers from global telecom service providers, a few months ago. High-ups of the PTCL were due to witness the contract signing ceremony programmed in Dubai, he added. “The whole process took almost a couple of months. And now finally the tender is going to be awarded,” he informed.
The PTCL, in September 2002, signed a memorandum of understanding with 12 international telecom carriers to jointly work on the construction of a new undersea fibre cable link called the South East Asia, Middle East, Western Europe 4 (SMW4). The undersea cable network would connect 12 countries - Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Italy and France. “The estimated cost of the project is around US$500 million. We (PTCL) would bear five per cent of the total cost,” informed the PTCL official. He said the consortium had estimated 18 months for the completion of the project, which would enable Pakistan to get its second undersea fibre link by December 2005. Currently, the country has only one undersea fibre link called South East Asia, Middle East, Western Europe 3 (SMW3).
Pakistan’s telecommunication system went through the worst-ever crisis last year when it was cut off from the rest of the world for over 12 hours due to fibre link damage. The incident first occurred on April 4 and then on July 7, 2003. The PTCL official claimed the completion of the SMW4 project would make the country’s telecom system safe and compliant with international standards, which he said was ‘essential in the deregulated scenario’. “It is necessary to have at least two undersea fibre links. We are committed to get the second one by the end of 2005,” said the PTCL official. He said the concerned official of each company in the consortium would hold meetings regularly to monitor the project work. He disclosed that the construction work of SMW4 would begin by June 2004. The other partners in the cable project are PT Indosat, Singapore Telecom, Telekom Malaysia Berhad, Bangladesh Telegraph and Telephone Board, Bharti Telesonic, Sri Lanka Telecom, Videsh Sanchar Nigam Limited, Emirates Telecom, Saudi Telecom, Telecom Egypt, Telecom Italia SPA and France Telecom. Currently, data traffic from South East Asia and the Middle East to Europe is routed via smaller capacity cables, mainly SMW3 and Fibre Link Around Globe (FLAG). The SMW4 project will be built using DWDM, with a proposed design capacity of 1.28 terabits per second (Tbps).