The new Bay of Bengal Gateway Cable has just been announced. This looks promising to be another diverse path to SMW4 cable system that most of the carriers are riding on. However, with the recent SMW4 cable outage that lasted for several weeks, diversity for the west bound is again in the spotlight.
Let's take a look at the various cable maps.
The BBG cable will connect from Singapore and all the way to Oman and the UAE. Then it should connect to europe via IMW or EIG.
IMEWE cable.
EIG cable.
For most part, it would appear to be diverse from SMW4. However, IMEWE and EIG also goes through the Suez Canal and on the same path as SMW4.
The reason why most cables goes through the Suez Canal is not because it is the shortest path but also because it is the easiest as it is on international waters. Imagine if you want to cut across these region via terrestrial. You would have to negotiate with countries like Iran, Saudi, Syria, etc. I think you get the picture. Operation and fault management would be a nightmare.
To be truly diverse, I think taking the terrestrial route seems to be the better option. For TEA, it goes from Hong Kong-China-Russia and on to other parts of Europe. Then why is this route not so popular? Well, mainly because of the cost. It can be as much as 2-3 times more than SMWE4. Until the price of this route comes down, looks like the submarine route will still be the preferred option for most carriers.
There's another new owner for Inteliquent which has seen several change of owners over the past few years. From Tiscali to Tinet (BS equity) to Inteliquent (neutral Tandem) and now GTT. The sale appears to be only the data portion. Neutral Tandem seems to realize the Data part is not making money and has drag themselves on a downward slope even since they decide to buy Tinet. So let's see who makes money so far from such sale.
BS equity buys Tiscali International Network for US$60 Million (47M Euro) in 2009.
Neutral Tandem then buys over for US$95 Million in 2010. Profit of $35 Million. Not bad for approximately just 2 years of ownership. Private equity main purpose is just to make money and they have done just that.
GTT now buys the data portion for US$54.5 Million in 2013. Is that a US$40.5 Million lost in less than 3 years for Neutral Tandem? That shows just how desperate they are in trying to get rid of the data portion to even making a loss. So what happens to the voice portion (the ex-Neutral Tandem)? Re-emerge as another new company?
