NTT Communications has announced plans to launch the Asia Submarine-cable Express (ASE) in June 2012. This 40-gigabit-per-second (Gbps) undersea cable will be put in place with assistance from Hong Kong-based NTT (News - Alert) Com Asia.

According to NTT Comm, the ASE will eventually connect major business hubs across East Asia with roughly 7,200 kilometers of cable. The company boasts that the ASE will offer a total carrying capacity that will exceed 15 terabits per second.

NTT Comm, Malaysia-based Telekom Malaysia (News - Alert), Philippines-based PLDT and Singapore-based StarHub are all working together to construct the ASE. The total cost of construction is estimated at roughly $430 million dollars.

When the ASE is in full operation, it will serve Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines. Plans include a separate route to Hong Kong to be added in December of 2012. Collaboration with major carriers in mainland China and additional Southeast Asian countries will ensure connections will be launched.

"The ASE's planned launch is further testament to NTT Com's growing presence in the markets of  Asia," said Akira Arima, president and CEO of NTT Com. "We are excited about the business opportunities we expect to realize by bridging Tokyo and other Asian economic hubs with our high-speed, high-capacity ASE cable network."

Offering the latest in 40 Gbps optical technology – and expected 100 Gbps optical technology in the future – the ASE will be able to strengthen the redundancy of NTT Com’s Asia cable networks and pave the way for enhanced global network services. The region has an increasing need for global traffic, low network latency and reliability, all of which are expected to be met with the launch of the ASE.

Specific designs address the opportunity for earthquakes and typhoons and the ASE will be made to withstand such pressures, especially in areas such as the Bashi Channel south of Taiwan, where undersea earthquakes have been known to disrupt international communications in the past.

Routes between Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore are planned so as to cover the shortest possible distances to maximize reliability and minimize latency.

In other NTT Communications (News - Alert) news, TMCnet reported last week that the company has enabled GoGrid to continually meet customer demands for increased bandwidth and capacity via NTT Communications Tier-1 Global IP Network. GoGrid delivers complete cloud infrastructure service solutions that enable its customers to easily deploy robust, customized cloud infrastructures.

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