Google Plans To Build a New Undersea Network Cable Connecting the US, UK and Spain

New submitter rewindustry writes: Google has announced plans to build a new undersea network cable connecting the US, UK and Spain. The tech giant says it is incorporating new technology into the cable, which it claims is a significant upgrade to older existing lines. The project is expected to be completed by 2022. Underwater data cables are vital to global communications infrastructure, carrying some 98% of the world's data, according to Google's estimate. The cables are usually built by communications firms -- typically a group of them pooling resources - which then charge other companies to use them. The latest cable, named "Grace Hopper" after an American computer scientist and naval rear admiral, will hit the UK at Bude, in Cornwall. It is Google's fourth privately owned undersea cable. But Google needs "an ever-increasing amount of transatlantic bandwidth," according to John Delaney from telecoms analyst IDC. "Building its own cables helps them choose cable routes that are most optimal," and near data centres, he said. "It also minimises operational expenditure by reducing the need to pay telcos and other third-party cable owners for the use of their infrastructure."

Death watch

[bosef1]

Perfect! Now I will have up-to-the-second results when I Google whether Francisco Franco is still dead.

Old Tech

[itiswhatitiwijgalt]

Isn't Starlink supposed to address this issue?

Re:

[omnichad]

Starlink needs ground stations. You think those satellites are all peer-to-peer? They'll need globally distributed ground stations in strategic locations connected to national backbones. Undersea cables are just as important to this as any ISP.

Re:

[itiswhatitiwijgalt]

If I read it correctly, its all peer-to-peer light comms that are synced in between the satellite mesh to provider quicker comms than undersea cables.

Re:Old Tech

[Strider-]

At this point, they do not yet have the inter-satellite links up and running, it's all bent-pipe at the moment.

The only current constellation using inter-satellite links on a regular basis is Iridium.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't Starlink supposed to address this issue?

One of Google's other new cables will carry 250 terabits per second. A single Starlink satellite can carry 20 gigabits per second total. You're off by four orders of magnitude. Starlink going to provide access to remote and rural areas. That will always be its target market.

Handy for GCHQ

[uncle slacky]

GCHQ Morwenstow is right next door: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GCHQ_Bude [wikipedia.org]

So purely for Google’s own traffic?

[93 Escort Wagon]

Not sure how much I care about this - it’s not even Google’s first undersea cable. I suppose it’s mildly interesting politically...

Actually, the interesting item (for me) in the story was learning that the first transatlantic data cable was for telegraph traffic between Ireland and the US - laid in 1858!

Re:So purely for Google’s own traffic?

[Strider-]

Actually, the interesting item (for me) in the story was learning that the first transatlantic data cable was for telegraph traffic between Ireland and the US - laid in 1858!

This is incorrect. The first Trans-Atlantic cable landed in Heart's Content, Newfoundland (which was an independent country at the time). The cable station in Heart's Content has been preserved, and it's quite an interesting place to visit. Plus, you're a short drive from Dildo, Newfoundland [wikipedia.org] which has a great brewery.

Re:

[bosef1]

I don't know... Even a short drive can be a real pain in the rear, especially if you're dealing with overly-slick travel conditions. Although a lack of lubrication can also cause difficulties. Naturally one would always be wearing rubbers in moist conditions such as those, for protection from the elements, should one damage a thrust bearing or drive shaft and suffer a premature culmination of their adventures.

Re:

[Areyoukiddingme]

I don't know... Even a short drive can be a real pain in the rear, especially if you're dealing with overly-slick travel conditions.

You managed to keep that going for at least two sentences longer than I expected. I salute you.

Grace Hopper

[Solandri]

Somehow, calling Grace Hopper [wikipedia.org] "an American computer scientist" doesn't do her justice. Her work was fundamental to the concepts of linking in computer code, and writing code in a human-readable language and having it compiled into machine code. She popularized the term "bug" meaning a problem with your code (based on a moth she found short circuiting one of the early computers - a literal hardware bug). Even among the pioneers in the field of computer science, she is a giant.

Re:

[dAzED1]

inversely, maybe we shouldn't be calling everyone with a 4 year degree that then allows them to find out why the office printer isn't working, a "scientist"

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Life Today Is Too Complicated For The Human Brain

[classiclantern]

So I have been thinking about the big picture. Bare with me one minute. One hundred years ago in the US the "robber barons" of the industrial revolution began to back, promote, and bribe politicians to pass laws that favored their industry. Oil, steel, railroads, finance, Getty, Carnegie, Crocker, Morgan, Rockeffleler, Ford, and the rest. Look it up. It was not illegal and it is not illegal today to "lobby" politicians. The "newspapers" of the time notified the voters and the voters elected new politi

Thou shallst count to three

[nospam007]

Four shalt thou not count.