Microsoft, Facebook and global telecommunication infrastructure company Telxius have completed the Marea subsea cable, the world’s most technologically advanced undersea cable. The Marea crosses the Atlantic Ocean over 17,000 feet below the ocean’s surface, connecting Virginia Beach with Bilbao, Spain.
Over 4,000 miles (6,600 kilometers) long and weighing nearly 10.25 million pounds (4.65 million kilograms), the Marea can transmit up to 160 terabits of data per second, which Microsoft notes is “more than 16 million times faster than the average home internet connection, making it capable of streaming 71 million high-definition videos simultaneously.” With digital services expected to see an eightfold increase in usage by 2025, it’s safe to say that capacity will probably be useful.
The Marea, which is Spanish for ‘tide,’ is designed to be interoperable with a variety of networking equipment. This openness will allow for the cable to evolve with the latest technologies in the years to come. In the present, Microsoft lists a wide array of cloud-based services that it aims to enhance with the Marea ranging from Bing and Office 365 to Skype and Xbox Live. For Facebook, Marea will increase its capabilities as the site looks to expand into VR.
Rafael Arranz, Telxius COO, has said in a previous statement that “all of these applications, especially everything that is driven by video, consume a huge amount of bandwidth. So everybody needs to be connected with a high-volume, high-bandwidth infrastructure.”
Source by Popular Mechanics
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