Tonga cable goes live

Tonga’s submarine link to Fiji and the trans-Pacific Southern Cross fibre optic cable was officially commissioned yesterday by King Tupou VI. The project, largely funded by the ADB and the World Bank, came in substantially under budget. The project cost approximately USD 25 million, lower than the initial projection of USD 33 million. It currently offers up to 620 megabits of available bandwidth, a vast increase over pre-existing satellite capability. Next month, Tonga will host PacINET, the annual Pacific regional ICT conference.

This article was written by

Dan McGarry

http://www.imagicity.com

Dan McGarry is chief technologist at the Pacific Insititute of Public Policy. He has worked in the Pacific for over a decade now, assisting in numerous capacities in the development of ICTs in Vanuatu and the Pacific. He has extensive experience in technology policy formulation and implementation as well as in traditional and new media. He still writes software.

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