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STL to Provide Subsea Fiber Optic Cable for Project Horizon in Australia

Subsea cable

STL, one of the industry’s leading digital network integrators, announces a partnership with Vocus Group for Project Horizon in Western Australia, where STL will provide the high strength subsea fiber optic cable for Vocus’ network expansion plans.

Project Horizon is Vocus’ first competitive fibre backbone deployment between Perth and Port Hedland. It is also the first major infrastructure project under Vocus’ $1 billion investment program. Upon completion of the Horizon project, it will fill the last gap in Vocus’ nationwide fiber optic network, connecting all capital cities.

The project’s subsea fiber optic line will also interconnect with two high-capacity submarine cables in Port Hedland. This will create a new hub for domestic and international data in northern Australia.

Generally speaking, optical fiber has a large transmission capacity and long distance between relay stations, making it suitable for long-distance communication under the sea. The fiber used for submarine fiber optic cable has higher requirements than the fiber used for terrestrial fiber optic cable.

Submarine fiber optic cable needs low loss, high strength and long length. The relay distance of this fiber optic cable is long, usually more than 50 km. In terms of the transmission performance of the fiber optic line requires that it can work properly within 25 years.

STL is the industry’s leading digital network integrator. It helps telcos, cloud companies, civic networks and large enterprises deliver an enhanced experience to their customers. STL previously provided Vocus with its optical networking solution, Opticonn, for a brownfield network construction project.

As Project Horizon’s fiber optic partner, STL will support Vocus’ network deployment with advanced, high compression strength fiber optic cable technology. These fiber optic cables have a design life of over 30 years, which ensures that Project Horizon will continue to provide high capacity connectivity through the Pilbara until 2050, even under harsh environmental conditions.

Vocus Group CEO Kevin Russell said Project Horizon was Vocus’ largest fibre infrastructure project. It will be the first competitive fibre to be delivered to Australia. The network has a design transmission capacity of 38 megabits per second per fibre pair. STL’s optical solution provides an efficient way for Vocus to upgrade and support higher capacity broadband at a lower incremental cost. It will play an important role in providing a high-speed and low-latency fiber infrastructure in Australia.