[Gettyimages Bank]
Submarine cables are key facilities that enable communication between countries and continents. More than 90 percent of transoceanic data traffic travels through underwater cables. According to global telecommunication equipment company Cisco, the world's annual Internet usage is projected to increase by 220 percent to 4.8 zettabytes in 2022 from 1.5 zettabytes in 2017. One zettabyte is one billion terabytes.
KT said in a statement on February 7 that the company signed a memorandum of understanding with Savills Korea to establish and operate the submarine optical cable network. The two companies will also cooperate to secure global cloud and telecommunications service operators. While Savills Korea carries out asset management projects such as contracting, licensing and attracting investors, KT will be in charge of the construction and operation of the new fiber-optic cable network.
"Demand derived from services such as digital transformation-based cloud services and over-the-top (OTT) falls upon not only South Korea, but the entire Asian region and submarine cable industry is anticipated to expand even further," KT's enterprise division head Shin Soo-jung was quoted as saying. KT said there have been growing demands for the stable operation of submarine cables due to the popularization of OTT video services and digital transformation of companies. The global OTT market is expected to reach $1,039 billion by 2027.
KT currently has the widest submarine cable infrastructure in South Korea including the Asia-Pacific Gateway. The cable was demonstrated in the 2018 Winter Olympics in the eastern ski resort of Pyeongchang to cover South Korea and eight other countries in the Asia-Pacific region.
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