Telecom firms launch new India-Europe fibre optic cable link

A consortium of nine global telecom companies, including India's Bharti Airtel and Tata Communications, today announced the launch of a high capacity fibre optic submarine cable that stretches from India to Europe.

The 13,000-km three pair fibre optic cable called IMEWE (India-Middle East-Western Europe), has a design capacity of 3.84 terabits per second, connecting India to Italy and France via the Middle East, with landings in Pakistan, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Lebanon en route, a member of the consortium said in a statement.

The other members of the consortium are Etisalat (UAE), France Telecom-Orange (France), OGERO (Lebanon), Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (Pakistan), Saudi Telecom Company (Saudi Arabia), Telecom Egypt (Egypt), Telecom Italia Sparkle (Italy).

IMEWE is the third major submarine cable connecting India and Europe after SMW3 and SMW4 and the new link is expected to play a major role in meeting the growing bandwidth requirement of Indian sub continent and Middle East to Europe and beyond. It would also help expand broadband services in the member countries.

The activation of the IMEWE will usher in faster an era of faster international connectivity while the three cable links would also serve as standbys for one another in case of technical problems in the other existing major cables on the route.