Spark, Vodafone and Telstra have jointly announced that the Tasman Global Access (TGA) cable is officially in service and ready to internet traffic between New Zealand and the world. The three operators report they have invested around NZD 100 million to build the TGA cable system, which stretches 2,288 km from Ngarunui Beach in Raglan, to Narrabeen Beach in Sydney Australia.
The cable has been deployed to increase international bandwidth and capacity for New Zealand, as well as strengthen diversity and resiliency within the country’s telecommunications infrastructure. The cable also serves as a digital link to Asian economic markets by enabling upgraded connectivity to the five major international cable systems currently serving Australia.
The TGA is comprised of two fibre pairs, has a total design capacity of 20 Tbps and has 20 repeaters which are used to amplify the optical signals along the length of the cable. The TGA cable was laid by the Alcatel Submarine Networks Ile De Re cable-laying ship.
The consortium of Spark, Vodafone and Telstra contracted Alcatel-Lucent Submarine Networks (ASN), now part of Nokia, to lay the TGA cable between Ngarunui Beach at Raglan and Narrabeen Beach in Australia. The TGA cable system is designed to serve future international bandwidth requirements for New Zealand consumers and businesses, which are forecast to grow by 11,000 percent in the next 10 years.
