In Chennai, Bharti Airtel Secures the SEA-ME-WE 6 Submarine Cable
This comes after the cable was successfully landed in Mumbai on December 30, 2024.
SubCom, a provider of subsea fiber optic systems, carried out the cable landings.
SMW6 Submarine Cable System
Via terrestrial routes, the 21,700 Rkm SMW6 cable spans Egypt to link India with Singapore and France (Marseille). According to Airtel, a major consortium member, it has co-built four private fiber pairs between Singapore, Chennai, and Mumbai in addition to investing in the core cable. India’s network gains 220 TBPs of global capacity thanks to the SMW6 cable infrastructure.
“We are thrilled to further enhance our worldwide connectivity by bringing one of the biggest cable systems into our facilities,” stated the director and CEO of Airtel Business. This strengthens our current network, which spans 50 countries and 400,000 Rkm. This further demonstrates our resolve to provide more routes, diversity, and capacity to meet Digital India’s expanding need for worldwide connection and data.
Integration with Nxtra Data Centers
“The cable landing, both in Mumbai and Chennai, will be fully integrated with Airtel’s data centre arm, Nxtra by Airtel, at its facilities in the respective cities with an aim to enable global hyperscalers and businesses in India to seamlessly access international connectivity and data centre services,” Airtel stated on Monday.
Enhancing India's Digital Connectivity
According to Airtel, its worldwide network covers five continents, and it has made 34 subsea investments in global cable networks, including the Southeast Asia-Japan Cable 2 (SJC2) and 2Africa. Airtel’s global subsea network investments include, among other things, cable systems like i2i Cable Network (i2icn), Europe India Gateway (EIG), IMEWE, SEA-ME-WE-4, AAG, Unity, EASSy, Gulf Bridge International (GBI), and Middle East North Africa Submarine Cable (MENA Cable), in addition to these cables that link India to important regions like APAC, Europe, the Middle East, and the US, the company noted.
