FLAG Telecom and Level 3 Communications announce joint agreement with Korea Telecom
FLAG Telecom (Nasdaq: FTHL; LSE: FTL), a global network services provider and independent carriers' carrier, and Level 3 Communications Holdings (Korea) Limited, a subsidiary of the global broadband infrastructure company Level 3 Communications, Inc. (Nasdaq: LVLT), announced an agreement with Korea Telecom covering the construction and operation of a landing station in Pusan, Korea, for the broadband submarine cable system currently being developed by FLAG Telecom and Level 3. Construction of the landing station in Pusan is already underway and will be completed later this year.
According to Ed McCormack, Chief Operating Officer for FLAG Telecom, the FLAG North Asian Loop (FNAL) will offer multi-terabit, protected capacity to the Korean market, connecting to the United States through our planned FLAG Pacific-1 cable system and to the FLAG Europe-Asia cable in Hong Kong and Japan.
Earlier this year, FLAG Telecom and Level 3 announced they would collaborate on the development of a multi-terabit, intra-Asia submarine cable system. The eastern leg of the system, being built by Level 3, will connect Japan, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Level 3 has completed construction of the link between Hong Kong and Japan and is currently building segments connecting this link to Taiwan. The western leg of the system, being built by FLAG Telecom, will connect Hong Kong, Korea and Japan and is currently under construction. The entire cable system will contain six fibre pairs, span over 10,000 kilometers and have a maximum capacity of 2.4-3.8 Tbps. With 6 fibre pairs, the cable system offers a maximum capacity of 2.4 terabits on its Hong Kong-Taiwan-Japan leg and 3.8 terabits on the second leg linking Japan, Korea and Hong Kong.
Each company will own three fibre pairs on the completed system. Level 3's fibre pairs are branded as "Tiger"; FLAG Telecom's three fibre pairs are branded as "FNAL".
Korea Telecom has started construction of the landing station in Pusan where the cable will land later this year. Once completed, the cable system is expected to provide Korean businesses and consumers with an abundant supply of affordable international broadband capacity, driving growth at all levels of the Korean broadband market.
About FLAG Telecom:
FLAG Telecom is a global network services provider and independent carriers' carrier providing products and services to the international carrier community, ASPs and ISPs across an international network platform designed to support the next generation of IP over optical data networks. For more information, visit www.flagtelecom.com.
About Level 3 Communications:
Level 3 (NASDAQ: LVLT) is a global communications and information services company offering IP services, broadband transport, colocation services and the Softswitch based services. For more information, visit www.Level3.com.