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Telstra buys quarter share of Southern Cross Cable Network

Published

4 years ago

December 19, 2018

(Image: Southern Cross Cable Network)

Telstra is set to buy into Southern Cross Cable Network through the purchase of new shares that will give the telco a 25 percent stake in the company.

The telco has also agreed to purchase “substantial” capacity on Southern Cross’ existing network and the NEXT subsea cable.

New Zealand telco Spark said that as a result of Telstra’s share purchase, its holding will be diluted to around 37.5 percent. Other shareholders of Southern Cross are Singapore’s Singtel, and Verizon Business.

“Telstra has long been a key customer of Southern Cross and this investment will mean Telstra has an immediate ownership interest in the existing Southern Cross network, as well as in Southern Cross NEXT,” Telstra group executive for enterprise Michael Ebeid said.

“This route is extremely important to our business as US to Australia traffic accounts for more than 80 percent of all the internet traffic to Australia.”

See: How Telstra handles subsea cables during typhoons

Southern Cross announced in August last year that it will start building the $350 million NEXT submarine cable, which it touted as being the fastest between Australia and New Zealand, and the United States.

The third cable is expected to provide an additional 60Tbps capacity to the existing 20Tbps on the two present Southern Cross cables, and will be ready for service in early 2020.

In July, Southern Cross said SubPartners had completed landing arrangements in Sydney.

“Landing arrangements in Australia, New Zealand, and the United States [are] now effectively completed,” Southern Cross CEO Anthony Briscoe said at the time.

“Our partnership with SubPartners for the construction of the facilities has allowed us to leverage their expertise in the construction of similar facilities for other projects that they are involved with in the region, helping us to effectively manage cost and risk around this critical aspect of the project.”

SubPartners is currently also working on the Indigo subsea cable system connecting Sydney, Perth, Singapore, and Jakarta, which is being built alongside Google, Singtel, Telstra, AARNet, Indosat Ooredoo, and Alcatel Submarine Networks and will span around 9,000km, with two fibre pairs and a design capacity of 18Tbps. It is expected to be completed by mid-2019.

In January, Southern Cross Cables announced that the Pacific islands of Fiji, Tokelau, and Kiribati had all signed contracts to be connected to the 60Tbps NEXT subsea cable.

Subsea cables across the globe

Vocus’ Australia-Singapore Cable (ASC)
Vocus’ North West Cable System (NWCS) between Darwin and Port Hedland, and the new Tiwi Islands spur being added
The Australian government’s Coral Sea subsea cable, being constructed by Vocus to connect Australia, Papua New Guinea, and Solomon Islands and funded through the foreign aid budget
Google’s Dunant transatlantic subsea cable between Virginia Beach in the United States to the French Atlantic coast
The Indian government’s Chennai-Andaman and Nicobar islands subsea cable, being built by NEC
Southern Cross Cables’ NEXT subsea cable system between Australia, New Zealand, and the United States, being built by SubPartners
The Trident subsea cable system connecting Perth with Singapore via Indonesia
The Jupiter subsea cable connecting the US, Japan, and the Philippines and being built by a consortium including Facebook, Amazon, SoftBank, NTT Com, PLDT, and PCCW
The Hawaiki subsea cable between Australia, New Zealand, and the US
Superloop’s Hong Kong cable
Telstra’s Hong Kong Americas (HKA) cable between Hong Kong and the US
Telstra’s Pacific Light Cable Network (PLCN) between Hong Kong and the US
Google’s Japan-Guam-Australia (JGA) cable system
The Asia-Pacific Gateway (APG) subsea cable connecting China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, and Singapore, owned by a consortium including China Telecom, China Unicom, China Mobile, NTT Communications, KT Corporation, LG Uplus, StarHub, Chunghwa Telecom, CAT, Global Transit Communications, Viettel, and VNPT, and being constructed by NEC
The Southeast Asia Japan 2 cable (SJC2), which will have 11 landing stations in Singapore, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Hong Kong, China, South Korea, Taiwan, and Japan, being built by NEC and funded by a consortium including China Mobile International, Chunghwa Telecom, Chuan Wei, Facebook, KDDI, Singtel, SK Broadband, and VNPT
The Bay to Bay Express Cable System (BtoBE), connecting Singapore and Hong Kong with the US, being funded by consortium including Facebook, Amazon Web Services (AWS), and China Mobile International, and being built by NEC
The South Atlantic Cable System (SACS) connecting Angola and Brazil, going live in October 2018 after being built by NEC

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Cars

15 Best SNES Games On Nintendo Switch Online

Published

11 mins ago

March 27, 2023

Francisco Peguero

Nintendo Switch Online has an awesome collection of old-school games sure to get your nostalgia running on overdrive. Here are some of our favorites.

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Zoom Just Added New AI-Powered Features, Here’s What They Do

Published

1 hour ago

March 27, 2023

Francisco Peguero

Zoom is also adding an AI-assisted auto-framing system called Intelligent Director to its Zoom Room system. This one relies on a multi-camera setup and picks up the best camera angle to depict a person in a video conference. The company says it paves the way for a “more equitable meeting experience for remote and in-person attendees.” Interestingly, Zoom is borrowing the idea of huddles from Slack, which itself introduced video chats to huddles last year that look a lot like Zoom. Introduced earlier today, Zoom Huddles is a video-centric virtual coworking space with a healthy bunch of collaboration features.

Zoom also wants to offer its very own email inbox and calendar so that users don’t have to jump between the video calling platform and other apps. The result of those ambitions is Zoom Mail, which is now available to all users as a client that can be connected to your existing Gmail or Microsoft inbox. Additionally, if you want Zoom’s very own email service, the company is also offering something called Zoom Mail Service with its very own hosting, but it is limited to paid customers only. Then there’s Zoom Calendar, which lives in the main sidebar and aims to replace rivals from Microsoft and Google that are currently a part of your workflow.

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How To Schedule Or Automate iPhone’s Always-On Display

Published

2 hours ago

March 27, 2023

Francisco Peguero

mokjc/Shutterstock

Apple’s iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max are the first iPhones with an always-on display. The setting is enabled by default in currently-available iOS builds, but you cannot schedule or automate iPhone’s always-on display. That changes with the latest iOS 16.4 beta, adding an option to automate the feature.

That sounds exciting, but here’s a caveat. Since iOS 16.4 is available as a release candidate to registered developers or public testers, you might find getting your hands on it challenging. Even if you decide to download it to automate your iPhone’s always-on display, you might experience some performance issues or bugs, ranging from worse battery life to iOS crashes.

Nevertheless, if you’re sure about trying the new features, head to the Apple Beta Software Program page and follow the instructions to install the latest iOS 16.4 beta, which has a new feature to schedule always-on display on the iPhones.

Automate always-on display using Focus Filters

boyudon/Shutterstock

Two ways to automate iPhone 14 Pro’s always-on display in iOS 16.4 are via Focus Filters and Shortcuts. First, let’s discuss the steps in enabling the feature via Focus Filters.

First, head to the Settings app on your iPhone and tap Focus.
Create a new Focus by pressing the plus icon in the top right corner. Select Custom from the available options and name the Focus mode. Tap on Customize Focus and head to the next screen.
Swipe down and select Add Filter under Focus Filters.
Under System Filters, select Always On Display. Ensure the Filter is enabled and tap Add in the top right corner.
Now, under Set A Schedule, do one of the following things.
1. Enable Smart Activation, which applies the Focus Filter at relevant times of the day based on your app usage, location, and other metrics.
2. Select Add Schedule and set when you want the Focus Filter to be active, enabling the always-on display.

You’ve successfully linked the always-on display to the Focus mode, which will now be active during the schedule you set.

Set up a Shortcut to activate always-on display

Primakov/Shutterstock

You can also connect your iPhone’s always-on display to a Shortcut.

Head to the Shortcuts app and press the plus icon in the top right corner.
Select Add Action and locate and select the Set Always On Display option through the search bar at the top.
By default, the Turn and On buttons activate the always-on display when you access the Shortcut.
Tap Done in the top right corner.
Accessing this Shortcut will trigger the always-on display.

Now that you know how to schedule or automate always-on display on your iPhone, here are a few things to remember. Currently, the feature is only available in iOS 16.4 beta, so regular users can’t access the feature. Although Apple is expected to release iOS 16.4 as a stable build for everyone soon, we can’t give an exact date. Second, using the always-on display might deplete your iPhone’s battery faster than usual, which is normal.