Google and Facebook teaming up for 12,800 kilometre fibre-optic cable from Los Angeles to Hong Kong

Google just announced that it’s partnering with Facebook to lay a 12,800-kilometer cable from Los Angeles to Hong Kong — the fastest underwater cable ever built, beating its own record.

In June 2016, Google started using FASTER, a network of Kevlar-wrapped cables starting on America’s West Coast and ending in Japan, with a top capacity of 60 terabytes per second. This new Pacific Light Cable Network, or PLCN, will top out at 120 terabytes per second once it’s officially ready to go in 2018.

The PLCN will help Google deliver the G Suite (formerly known as Google apps) and other Google Cloud services to the Asia-Pacific region, a growing market that all tech companies are after. 

This is the sixth underwater cable in which Google holds a stake. For its part, Facebook has been partnering up with the likes of Microsoft to build out its own network of undersea cables.

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