Docomo to lay down new undersea fiber optic cable

Docomo Pacific unveiled to the CNMI community its project to build a new undersea fiber optic cable, which will be named “Atisa.” A memorandum of understanding was signed between Docomo and the government, with the latter to invest $3 million in the project. Photos shows Gov. Ralph DLG Torres and Lt. Gov. Victor Hocog clasping hands with Docomo executives, led by president and chief executive officer John Kriegel, during the anouncement of the project. (Frauleine Villanueva-Dizon)

Telecommunications company Docomo Pacific formally announced to the community their project to lay down a new undersea fiber optic cable and has signed a memorandum of understanding with the administration.

The “state-of-the-art six fiber pair optical fiber submarine cable system”—which was given the name “Atisa” meaning “increase”—will literally connect all three islands of Saipan, Tinian, and Rota to Guam and will measure approximately 175 miles in length.

Docomo Pacific president and chief executive officer John Kriegel led the presentation of the $25-million project before the various public agencies and members of the business community yesterday at the Fiesta Resort and Spa.

Kriegel said he was frustrated that he wasn’t able to do the improvements in the CNMI when he came for the first time two years ago and saw that Docomo only has 2G connectivity.

“But Mother Nature intervened last year,” Kriegel said, reminding the public of the cable cut that happened in July of last year after Typhoon Dolphin and the devastation of Typhoon Soudelor.

Kriegel said those events have highlighted the real need for another undersea cable in the CNMI, which also led to the Legislature passing a resolution supporting and empowering Docomo to rebuild and harden the CNMI’s telecommunication infrastructure.

“The call to action was really the Legislature,” Kriegel said.

In an interview, Kriegel said the increased bandwidth that the new cable will bring means that Docomo will be able to bring all of the services that they offer in Guam to the CNMI such as LTE mobile networks on Saipan, Tinian, and Rota, high definition cable television, an increase number of channels to 160, and faster and more reasonably priced Internet.

Kriegel said it will provide “real time streaming services that you would expect to have in Guam or in the mainland United States.”

The whole project will cost about $25 million which will also include building redundant microwave backup system also connecting Saipan to Tinian, Tinian to Rota, and then Rota to Guam, and expanding and fixing their mobile networks in all three islands.

Project timeline

Kriegel said Atisa should come online in the first half of 2017.

“Permitting is the part of the process that takes the absolute longest,” Kriegel said, adding that it takes about 12 months to do the permitting because they would have to coordinate with the CNMI, Guam, and federal governments.

“You have to know exactly where the cable will land on all four islands. We have just started and in the process of finishing that up within the next couple of weeks,” Kriegel said.

He added that the actual laying of the cable will only take less than three weeks.

“One of the important features of the cable in order to provide real redundancy to the people of the CNMI, is to have diverse landing points so we’ll have diverse route underwater, we’ll have our electronics, cable landing station equipment in diverse areas,” Kriegel said.

“Some natural disaster should strike, something should befall one cable, then the other cable should be operational,” he added.

Docomo has partnered with NEC Corporation from Japan as their technology partner.

According to NEC Corp. submarine network division general manager Naoki Yoshida, the high-speed technology means that the cable will bring means that data can travel over 200,000 kilometers per second.

“I hope that all of the people here please continue to pressure NEC and one year later, we’ll be happy to report about the success of the business,” Yoshida said.

NTT Docomo managing director for global business division Koichi Takahara thanked the CNMI for the opportunity to make a difference.

“There are few places like this in the world for us to use our technology to make such a big impact so to be given the chance to change the way this community is communicating to the world, is a once in a lifetime opportunity that we are truly grateful for,” Takahara said.

“We’re really excited to be pursuing this project. A project of this complexity and of this scope requires real partnership and we really have that with the government of the CNMI,” Kriegel said.

$3 million

As part of the memorandum of understanding between Docomo and the CNMI government, the administration will be contributing $3 million to help the telecom with the project.

Gov. Ralph DLG Torres said they have not determined yet where the money will come from, but they are looking at providing about $1 million a year to assist Docomo in one way or another.

“For sure,” Torres said when asked if it is a worthy investment, “After our experience last year, we want to provide our community, our business community, our residents, options and services that will assist in our livelihood so that our economy can grow, and also our education sector. This would definitely help our education system.”

Torres added that this provides an opportunity to open up the market and that if another entity is coming in, they are welcome.

“This does not stop any other company, obviously we have IT&E. We are also supporting them, we have our contract agreement, we’re going to abide by that,” Torres said.