Solomon Islands and Huawei signs historic submarine cable project

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and the Board of the Solomon Submarine Cable (SSC) has announced the start of the deployment of the long-anticipated submarine cable system with the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding and Co-operation between the Solomon Islands Government and Huawei International in Honiara.

Other documents signed Tuesday included the main turnkey contract for supply between the Solomon Submarine Cable and Huawei International.

The system will comprise 2 optical fibre pair cable International link from Sydney to Honiara which will have a potential capacity of 2.5 Terrabits/s plus a domestic network linking Noro in the Western Province and Auki in Malaita Province with Honiara.  

The system includes a Branching Unit in the International section for possible use by another regional operator in due course.  The total distance covered by the cable system is approximately 4000 km of which 3400km is the distance from Honiara to Sydney and the remaining 600km is the full length of the domestic network.

Solomon Submarine Cable will operate as a wholesale supplier of Internet and data capacity to Australia for all licensed operators in Solomon Islands.  

It is anticipated to significantly improve reliability and reduce the cost of bandwidth to the operators from its launch, allowing them to grow their internet based businesses strongly.

The project duration is approximately 18 months and Solomon Submarine Cable anticipates opening service in the first quarter of 2019.....

SOURCE: SIG/ONE PNG