Skip to main content

Microsoft And Facebook Team Up To Build Transatlantic Data Cable


The computing giant and social media titan will work together to roll out the new MAREA cable across 6,600km of the Atlantic Ocean as it looks to deal with growing customer demand for faster data connections.
Set to begin construction in August 2016, the cable is expected to see completion in October 2017, providing a significant boost in data transfer speeds across the Atlantic.

Linked up

image: http://www.techweekeurope.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/MAREA-Cable-600x389.jpg
MAREA-CableThe project will be overseen by new Telefónica subsidiary Telxius, which will operate and manage the building and deployment of the cable, which will link Virginia Beach in the eastern United States to Bilbao in Spain, before extending on to network hubs in Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Asia.
Microsoft does have previous experience in underwater engineering, having earlier this year tested an underwater data centre that it hopes could reduce cloud latency by being placed close to heavily populated areas near coastlines.
Project Natick, which held a test rack of servers, was sunk 30 feet off California for four months in 2015, with Microsoft now looking to further develop the research by building larger capsules that could possibly house cloud services such as Azure and Office 365.
“As the world is increasingly moving toward a future based on cloud computing, Microsoft continues to invest in our cloud infrastructure to meet current and future growing global demand for our more than 200 cloud services, including Bing, Office 365, Skype, Xbox Live and the Microsoft Azure platform,” said Christian Belady, Microsoft’s general manager, datacentre strategy, planning & development.
“The MAREA transatlantic cable we’re building with Facebook and Telxius will provide new, low-latency connectivity that will help meet the increasing demand for higher-speed capacity across the Atlantic. By building the cable along this new southern route, we will also increase the resiliency of our global network, helping ensure even greater reliability for our customers.”
Connecting the world...

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Security Alert; Bart Ransomware Bypasses Corporate Firewalls

A new ransomware variant has emerged that’s similar to widespread threats such as Dridex 220 and Locky Affid=3, but uses a security-evading technique that may allow it to attack organisations protected from other malware, according to computer security researchers. Ransomware has spread quickly in the last few months, as a number of payouts have attracted cyber-criminals to the technique.
Post a Comment
Read more

Floods Leave Many Dead in Southern Ghana

Four days of heavy and steady rain has left at least 10 people dead in the south of Ghana. The streets of Accra have been left under water after the torrential downpours caused widespread flooding earlier this week. The nation's capital was hit bit 185mm of rain on Sunday, which is more than they would expect for the entire month of June. This is the wettest month of the year with an average rainfall of 178mm. Since the weekend a further 50mm of rain has fallen exacerbating the severe problems already faced. President John Dramani Mahama has surveyed the areas concerned. He was reported to have driven through several neighbourhoods on a motorcycle. Heavy downpours were also recorded 150km to the west of Accra in the Central Regional capital, Cape Coast where 10 people died in floods,  Sandy Amartey, regional coordinator of the National Disaster Management organisation, told AFP. "In all we have 10 to 12 who lost their lives during this rainy season." The rain...
Post a Comment
Read more

EC Slaps Apple With £11bn Irish Tax Bill

The European Commission (EC), as expected, has ordered the Irish government to recover up to €13 billion (£11bn) plus interest in “illegal tax benefits”. An investigation found Apple had been able to avoid taxation on almost all profits generated in the EU single market thanks to a structure which routed revenues through two “paper” headquarters in Ireland and minimal tax rates in the country. The EC says Apple only paid an effective corporate tax rate that fell from one percent in 2003 to 0.005 percent in 2014 – a rate which other companies in Ireland were not subjected to. This effectively amounted to state aid, the commission said. Apple tax amazon“Member States cannot give tax benefits to selected companies – this is illegal under EU state aid rules,” said Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, who is in charge of competition policy. “The Commission’s investigation concluded that Ireland granted illegal tax benefits to Apple, which enabled it to pay substantially less tax than ...
Post a Comment
Read more