Global digital infrastructure company Exa Infrastructure said it has reached an agreement with Spain-based submarine cable specialist IslaLink to become a key landing and terrestrial services partner in Italy and anchor tenant on the ‘Ionian’ submarine cable system connecting Italy and Greece. Under the deal, Exa will offer Islalink a fibre route between the southern Italian coastal city of Crotone and the data centre hubs of Milan and Rome. It will also construct the beach manhole and front-haul ducts in Crotone, and provide maintenance services for the cable landing station.
Exa will also be a main anchor customer on the new cable and will construct a new 345-kilometre high fibre-count G.652D cable between its existing network in Bari and Crotone, to ensure that the quality of the Ionian fibre cable is matched by that of the terrestrial backhaul.
Ionian is 24 fibre pair fibre optic cable stretching across the Ionian Sea from Crotone in southern Italy to Preveza in Greece, offering an alternative to the existing ageing subsea cables in the region. The cable is being deployed by the Orange group’s Italian marine network subsidiary Elettra and will be ready for service in the fourth quarter of 2022.
