The Tasman Global Access (TGA) fibre optic network has launched the first direct connection between Sydney and Hamilton. The launch is expected to offer additional resilience to New Zealand’s telecommunications infrastructure and increases the amount of capacity available to be used on the cable.
The TGA forms part of the mission critical backbone of the internet, linking New Zealand with Australia. The cable also serves as a digital link to Asia via the five major international cable systems currently connecting Australia.
Prior to this upgrade, the original TGA network included the trans-Tasman submarine cable and existing optic networks which connected points of presence in Sydney and Auckland only.
First transmitting data in 2017, the TGA encompasses 2,288 km of submarine fibre cable with a total design capacity of 20 Tbps and was built by a consortium including Vodafone New Zealand, Spark and Telstra.
Capacity on this new cable is also provided to 2degrees under an infrastructure sharing arrangement with Vodafone New Zealand.
