Cahaya Malaysia, TM’s latest submarine cable, to begin ops Aug 20

• TM’s largest investment in a single international submarine cable system to date
• Offers lowest latency between Malaysia to Japan and Hong Kong

TELEKOM Malaysia Berhad (TM) has announced that its latest international submarine cable system Cahaya Malaysia, which links Malaysia to Japan, will begin carrying Internet traffic on Aug 20.
 
Its link to Hong Kong is scheduled for completion in the first quarter of 2013, the company said in a statement.
 
Cahaya Malaysia, which began construction in January 2011, is TM’s wholly owned 2-fiber-pair system within the 6-fiber-pair Asia Submarine cable Express (ASE) system linking Malaysia to Japan, Hong Kong, the Philippines and Singapore.
 
“We are excited with the rollout of our latest submarine cable system as it marks yet another historic milestone not only for TM, but also for the Malaysian telecommunications industry,” said Mohamad Rozaimy Abd Rahman, executive vice president of Global, TM.
 
“Cahaya Malaysia is TM’s largest investment in a single international submarine cable system to date,” he said.
 
ASE is deployed with total carrying capacity exceeding 15 terabits per second (Tbps) riding on a 40 Gbps Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) optical technology and will eventually incorporate 100 Gbps technology.
 
The ASE cable system is a collaboration between TM, Japan’s NTT Communications Corporation (NTT Com), Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT) and Singapore’s StarHub.
 
The low-latency cable which spans over 7,800 km was developed to maximize reliability, withstand earthquake and typhoon damage and cover the shortest distance to Japan, TM said.
 
Cahaya Malaysia will enhance TM’s reliable global network services by boosting the capacity and strengthening its ability to provide Malaysia with better regional reach and seamless interconnections, the company claimed.

This cable system will provide an alternative, diverse routing within the Asia Pacific region to avoid areas prone to seismic activities which are hazardous to undersea cables. It also has the potential to provide an alternative route as well as restoration paths to existing cable systems in the region as it is designed to provide seamless interconnection to existing trans-Pacific cable systems linking Asia-Pacific to North America such as UNITY, Trans Pacific Express (TPE), Tata Global Network (TGN), PC-1 and the Japan-US Cable Network (JUSCN).
 
“TM is working hand-in-hand with the Government in fulfilling the aspirations of the Economic Transformation Program (ETP), especially in the Communications and Content Infrastructure or CCI area.
 
“This investment into Cahaya Malaysia falls directly under Entry Point Project (EPP) 10 of the ETP, ‘Extending the Regional Network,’” Rozaimy said.
 
The landing station of Cahaya Malaysia is located in Mersing, which also lands other major cables systems -- the Asia America Gateway (AAG) and the South East Asia-Middle East-Western Europe 3 (SEA-ME-WE3).
 
TM owns and leases capacity on more than 10 submarine cable systems, which span more than 60,000 fiber-route miles around the globe, including several submarine cable routes that the company uses to carry traffic between the Asia-Pacific region and North America.