Gemini submarine link steps closer to completion

By STEPHEN HARDY

The Gemini transatlantic submarine fiber-optic cable venture will reach a major milestone this month with the final splicing of its southern route. With the system expected to be ready for initial service from London to New York City by the first quarter of 1998, the system`s backers anticipate they will be first in line for an expected windfall of telecommunications traffic that has already drawn the notice of potential competitors.

The Gemini project is the result of a joint venture between Cable & Wireless plc of the United Kingdom and WorldCom Inc. of the United States. The two signed an agreement in October 1996 to create a submarine network that would supplement the existing, nearly exhausted transatlantic submarine capacity represented by such systems as tat-12 and -13. Besides providing the two international telecommunications companies with a transatlantic link of their own, the venture was foreseen as a well-timed response to the expected appearance of new telecommunications companies sparked by global deregulation and the voracious bandwidth appetite of Internet users.

When fully completed in the fourth quarter of next year, the Gemini network will comprise three self-healing Synchronous Digital Hierarchy loops. The major loop consists of a pair of undersea cable runs. The northernmost cable will extend from Oxwich Bay in South Wales, UK, to Charles-town, RI; the southern cable will stretch from Porthcurno, UK, to Manasquan, NJ. The remaining rings are backhaul loops in each country, one running from Charlestown to New York City and on to Manasquan, the other joining the U.K. landing points with London.

The resulting network will include 12,600 km of undersea singlemode fiber cabling, with each cable run comprising four fiber pairs capable of 15-Gbit/sec transmission (with 15-Gbit/sec restoration capability), for a total of 30 Gbits/sec on the network. The system will take advantage of both wavelength-division multiplexing (wdm) and add/drop multiplexing technologies. The result will be enough capacity to accommodate 1.5 million simultaneous voice calls--approximately twice as much capacity as currently exists under the Atlantic, according to Jeremy Thompson, managing director of Gemini Submarine Cable Ltd.

"What drove us [in the design of the three-loop architecture] was the inherent integrity that was required in the system--such that the cable could actually be broken in three parts and we could still preserve end-to-end integrity for customers," Thompson explains.

Several companies will contribute to the completion of the project. WorldCom will supply the backhaul links in the United States, with the aid of Alcatel wdm equipment. Cable & Wireless Communications (formerly Mercury Communications) will fill the same role for the U.K. backhaul loop. CIENA will supply the wdm equipment for this part of the network, according to Thompson.

For the undersea portion, Alcatel Submarine Networks serves as the principal contractor (including the undersea electronics), with Cable & Wireless Marine acting as the marine subcontractor. The two have started work on the southern run, with a Cable & Wireless ship laying 2900 km of cable eastward from Manasquan and another ship spooling out 3300 km in the opposite direction from Porthcurno. The splicing of these cables, scheduled to take place in the middle of this month, will signal a major event for the project.

But the commissioning of the southern route this December and the inauguration of full London-to-New York service in February 1998 will mark the network`s full appearance on the telecommunications scene--and fully illuminate, Gemini`s sponsors hope, the venture`s two greatest attributes. The first of these is time to market; Gemini will be available for use before such other planned transatlantic networks as Global Telesystems Ltd.`s Atlantic Crossing 1 (AC-1--see Lightwave, June 1997, page 7), Neptune Communications` Atlantic Express (see Lightwave, July 1997, page 7), and the new Project Oxygen (see page 1 of this issue) as well as such other, more nascent efforts as the networks now under consideration by TeleBermuda and ComSouth.

The other advantage derives from the land-based backhauls, which effectively give potential customers access to the transatlantic capacity from major hubs, obviating the burden of acquiring an additional hub-to-beachhead connection. "We also chose the configuration--a three-loop network which links New York to London--simply because we wanted to make it as easy as possible for our customers to purchase capacity where they really needed it," says Andy Hedges, marketing manager at Gemini Submarine Cable. "Our [network] begins in the city and ends in the city, premises to premises. Again, that was the result of direct feedback from potential customers who said they wanted the ability to purchase a network where they really needed the capacity picked up and delivered."

This combination of being first on the scene and offering an end-to-end fiber-optic network will appeal particularly to smaller companies and startups that have neither the capital nor the expertise to use more-complicated alternatives, the venture principals believe. In fact, say Thompson and Hedges, irrefutable rights of use (irus) will be made available in such a way that such companies can buy capacity almost on demand. That capacity will be available with an existing network management structure provided by Cable & Wireless and WorldCom, which will further reduce the difficulty smaller companies might face in using such networks, they say. Finally, according to the Gemini spokesmen, the fact that the two landing sites on each end of the network are separated by a significant distance helps ensure network integrity by decreasing the chances that a single disaster (such as a ship`s dragging anchor) could sever both cables.

In addition, Gemini will share the Porthcurno landing site with the Fiber-optic Link Around the Globe system (see Lightwave, August 1997, page 9). This collocation will give customers ready access to a pipeline to the Middle East and Asia as well, Thompson and Hedges say.

The project has already attracted four customers. While Thompson and Hedges decline to disclose their identities, they described these customers as telecommunications companies that will be using the system "for both voice and data."

Stiff competition

Even if the principals at Gemini have read the current telecommunications map correctly, they will still find competition fierce, according to Tom Soja, a senior analyst at Kessler Marketing Intelligence Corp., Newport, RI. AC-1, a project in which Soja has had some involvement, will prove particularly worthy, he says.

Gemini`s advantages over AC-1 are slight, in Soja`s mind. "Well, they`ll only be first to market by about three months, I think, versus AC-1," he says by way of example. "AC-1 is also coming in with capacity, although from what I can tell, at a much lower price than Gemini. On the other hand, Gemini is offering irus at the DS-3 level, which is a 45-Mbit/sec circuit, and AC-1 is offering a minimum circuit size of an STM-1, which is three times, essentially, that size; it`s a 155.5-Mbit/sec circuit. So, Gemini may have some advantages for smaller players."

As for the benefits of including the backhaul links in the same package as the transatlantic capacity, Soja states, "Yes, that is important, I guess, insofar as it helps their customers connect from the cable stations into the point of presence at the international switches." However, Soja wonders if customers will be locked into the backhaul links and thus be unable to take advantage of lower-cost alternatives should they appear.

While Soja also questions the wisdom of buying capacity from competitors rather than a disinterested carrier`s carrier, Thompson and Hedges say the fact that WorldCom and Cable & Wireless will be using the network themselves gives them double incentive to ensure that it is running at peak efficiency.

One question that still bears watching, says Soja, is the amount of capacity the two principals plan to reserve for themselves. WorldCom in particular appears to have positioned itself as a major force in the Internet market through its recent acquisitions of the networking divisions of both CompuServe Corp. and America Online Inc. (with the latter move involving the ans Communications unit of America Online). WorldCom previously acquired mfs Communications, which itself owned another Internet company, uunet Technologies. So, says Soja, it appears WorldCom will require a significant amount of bandwidth for its own purposes.