Google Inc. is planning to build a multi-terabit undersea fiber-optic communications cable across the Pacific Ocean to link its U.S. operations with Asia, set for launch in 2009, according to a report in CommsDay, a telecom industry news and commentary site for Australia and Asia.
According to CommsDay sources, a group of unnamed carriers and representatives of Google were meeting in Sydney for high-level talks on the plan, dubbed “Unity,” over the last week.
“Apparently, CommsDay claims that the search giant is in talks with Asian and Australian companies over the “Unity” project to lay a Google-owned line from the west coast of the US to the Asian subcontinent.”
“The deal would give Google access to the fiber at “build cost” and possibly access to Asian ISPs behind their international gateways.”
The move would also potentially allow the search engine to team up with Asia’s internet service providers “behind their international gateways,” thus improving the affordability of internet services across the continent.
Google’s bandwidth costs are so high already, how the company can pay for a cable investment out of its “normal bandwidth budget today,” said Dave Burstein, editor of DSL Prime. “Google wants to buy wholesale instead of retail and this gives them tremendous opportunity in video” and other high-bandwidth media, he said.
The move would also provide Google with substantial future cost savings, since it would give an “at cost” link to the fastest growing internet population on the planet and reduce the company’s dependence on third parties.
Asia Netcom and Telstra have discussed the concept with the California-based search engine leader, CommsDay reports, with up to a dozen other companies involved in the Unity cable.
“They do not include, however, the company behind the upcoming Asia America Gateway cable, Telekom Malaysia, which has not been invited to participate in talks.”
In addition, Google has positioned its “Docs and Apps” services as ultimately competing head-to-head with Microsoft Office. “There will be a lot of traffic when people starting using it at that scale,” Burstein said.
Google’s network costs are “probably half of Yahoo’s and Microsoft’s,” he added, noting that in going after its own trans-Pacific cable, the search giant might be “going a jump beyond dropping costs.”
“The Unity cable, as it is being called, has been under development for several months and is set to launch in 2009, according to the report.”
The Unity project was previously announced by Mike Saunders, the Level 3 executive, who said at a Singapore conference that the fiber cable is one of a few new communications channels to be laid under the Pacific. Unity was planned for a service launch in 2009, Saunders said at the time.
An unrevealing spokesman for the search engine Barry Schnitt would not confirm or deny the existence of the project, saying: “Additional infrastructure for the internet is good for users and there are a number of proposals to add a Pacific submarine cable. We are not commenting on any of these plans.”
By making more broadband available, Google can drive down prices, making it easier to bring more of the world online. “Anything that brings more people to the Internet is good for Google,” Burstein said.
Up to 80 per cent of the world’s communications are carried by undersea cables, the most advanced of which can transfer seven terabytes of data every second. There are five trans-pacific cables in operation and another one already planned.
“However, the route for laying the cable has not been determined, but it could potentially connect Australia to new and existing cables in Guam and Hawaii, according to the report.”
Fiber optics is not the only data communications medium eyed by the search giant. Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt confirmed late August the company’s intention to pursue its interests in the upcoming auction set by the FCC for the wireless spectrum in the 700 MHz band.
Google’s bid is conditioned by the acceptance of a framework which the Mountain View behemoth has long lobbied for, aimed at ensuring “greater competition and consumer choice.”
Earlier this year, Google has advertised for a submarine cable negotiator position to “identify highly cost-effective solutions under the most favorable commercial and technical terms possible” and who would work on “new projects or investments in cable systems that Google may contemplate to extend or grow its backbone.”
When asked to comment on the move, a spokesperson said that it should not be surprising that the company is looking for qualified people to help secure additional network capacity.
“In some parts of the world, these people will work with submarine cables because there is a lot of ocean out there,” the spokesperson added.
While a new cable would add even more capacity, demand would meet that capacity within a few years, Colby Synesael, an analyst at Merriman Curhan Ford Corp., told the Wall Street Journal. “Even if it does create a bubble today, I would argue that capacity demand would catch up in two to three years,” he was quoted as saying.
The proposed line could be in service by the end of 2009.