Upgrade to subsea system spanning half the length of the Equator will boost capacity for broadband and cloud computing while increasing trans-Pacific network diversity between the Asia and the US
Paris, September 26, 2013 — Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) and Asia America Gateway, the cable system owned by a consortium of operators, have reaffirmed their cooperation with the signature of a contract to upgrade the Asia America Gateway (AAG) submarine cable system, covering the route from Philippines to the United States.
By leveraging Alcatel-Lucent’s advanced coherent technology, the 20,000km-long AAG system will add multi-terabit data capacity to cope with the rapid expansion of data traffic in countries along its route, while rapidly increasing its capability to meet cloud service requirements.
Spanning almost half the length of the Equator, AAG connects Malaysia to the US via Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Vietnam, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Guam, Hawaii and the US west coast. When it was launched in 2009, the Asia-America Gateway represented a breakthrough in delivering the first terabit submarine cable network between south-east Asia and the US, being designed for an ultimate capacity of 1.92 terabit-per-second (Tbit/s). The advanced coherent technology to be used for this upgrade will deliver a capability to upgrade the system to over 8 Tbit/s and will contribute to further strengthen communications reliability over the Asia-US route.
Mr. Vito Pavone, Chairman of the AAG Management Committee said: “This new investment in additional capacity on the AAG system will further help to address the persistent demand for anywhere, anytime broadband access. Alcatel-Lucent’s technology offers an adaptable solution to continue implementing our staged upgrade strategy to meet significant bandwidth increments over time, while protecting our investments in the subsea plant.”
Philippe Dumont, President of Alcatel-Lucent Submarine Networks, said: “We are pleased to help AAG operators allow quicker service acceleration to meet the expectations of their customers for high-quality broadband applications, storage and computing. Alcatel-Lucent’s unique solution delivers an easy means of scaling up to multi-terabit capacity, offering evolution for submarine line terminal equipment while combining technological and economic benefits.”
About the Alcatel-Lucent solution
The Alcatel-Lucent solution is based on the 1620 Light Manager submarine line terminal equipment using coherent technology at 40G (gigabits-per-second), expandable to 100G, to provide the most efficient use of the available optical spectrum. The terminal offers optimal scalability and flexibility thanks to its use of Alcatel-Lucent’s advanced coherent technology, which also incorporates the latest Soft Decision Forward Error Correction (SDFEC) technology. Additionally, Alcatel-Lucent’s technology offers multi-vendor adaptability. With more than 100 upgrades completed over the years, Alcatel-Lucent’s field-proven submarine technology offer carriers, service providers, multi-media and content providers a seamless state-of-the-art path to expand their networks in a cost-effective way thanks to the optimisation of dry plant and wet plant to extract maximum performance.
More about AAG
The system was originally deployed by Alcatel-Lucent and NEC with a contract awarded in 2007 and it was upgraded a first time in 2011 by Mitsubishi.
ABOUT ALCATEL-LUCENT (EURONEXT PARIS AND NYSE: ALU)
Alcatel-Lucent is at the forefront of global communications, providing products and innovations in IP and cloud networking, as well as ultra-broadband fixed and wireless access to service providers and their customers, enterprises and institutions throughout the world.
Underpinning Alcatel-Lucent in driving the industrial transformation from voice telephony to high-speed digital delivery of data, video and information is Bell Labs, an integral part of Alcatel-Lucent and one of the world’s foremost technology research institutes, responsible for countless breakthroughs that have shaped the networking and communications industry. Alcatel-Lucent innovations have resulted in the company being recognized by Thomson Reuters as a Top 100 Global Innovator, as well as being named by MIT Technology Review as amongst 2012’s Top 50 “World’s Most Innovative Companies”. Alcatel-Lucent has also been recognized for innovation in sustainability, being named Industry Group Leader for Technology Hardware & Equipment sector in the 2013 Dow Jones Sustainability Indices review for making global communications more sustainable, affordable and accessible, all in pursuit of the company’s mission to realize the potential of a connected world.
With revenues of Euro 14.4 billion in 2012, Alcatel-Lucent is listed on the Paris and New York stock exchanges (Euronext and NYSE: ALU). The company is incorporated in France and headquartered in Paris.
For more information, visit Alcatel-Lucent on: http://www.alcatel-lucent.com, read the latest posts on the Alcatel-Lucent blog http://www.alcatel-lucent.com/blog and follow the Company on Twitter: 
http://twitter.com/Alcatel_Lucent.
PR Archives: Latest, By Company, By Date