ABU DHABI, 28 December 2004 — The cable ship CS Niwa has begun operations to lay Segment 2 — from Mumbai to Jeddah — of the Southeast Asia, Middle East and Western Europe (SMW4) project to connect Singapore to France through the UAE. The CS Niwa is owned by Emirates Telecommunications and Marine Services (e-Marine), a subsidiary of Emirates Telecommunications Corporation (Etisalat).
The SMW4 project is the fourth in a series of ambitious submarine cables linking the East and West. It is hoped that the cables will help bridge the digital divide between the developed and developing countries and, effectively, connect the world.
The SMW4 submarine cable network, which is the fourth of its kind since 1982, will be about 20,000-km long, including the main trunk line and branches, and will cost about $500 million to build. Alcatel Submarine Networks and Fujitsu Ltd. are lead contractors on the project, which is being financed by 16 different telecom companies. Sponsors include Algeria Telecom, Bangladesh Telecom, CAT Telecom of Thailand, Etisalat of the UAE, France Telecom, US telecoms firm MCI, Pakistan Telecom, Saudi Telecom, Singapore Telecom, Sri Lanka Telecom, Telecom Egypt, Telecom Italia, Tunisia Telecom and India’s VSNL.
The CS Niwa set sail for Calais, France, from Abu Dhabi in October, where, under the contract awarded to e-Marine by Alcatel, it took on a cargo of submarine cable before proceeding to lay the cable. Of the total 20,000-km length of the SMW4 cable, e-Marine will lay 5,500 km of submarine cable in Segment 2, connecting Mumbai, Karachi, Fujairah, Jeddah to Suez and will also be involved in Segment 1 of the project, involving shore-end burial and other ancillary works in Mumbai. CS Niwa has the capacity to load 6,000 tons of cable.
This new cable system, which will be operative in the third quarter of 2005, will facilitate 20 million voice calls plus broadcast television channels at the same time. The SMW4 cable will also connect to existing telecom networks in Europe.
E-Marine is involved in several major international submarine cable systems. Apart from their three cable-ships, e-Marine also provides storage services for submarine cables and accessories in its depot in Abu Dhabi, along with testing and jointing facilities.
