Equinix, Ellalink build Latin America-Europe subsea cable
Equinix, a digital infrastructure company and data centre provider has partnered with advanced optical platform Ellalink on the first-ever high-capacity subsea cable between Latin America and Europe.
Delivered by EllaLink to Equinix's International Business Exchange (IBX) data centres—SP4 in São Paulo, LS1 in Lisbon and MD2 in Madrid—the new system, now fully operational, provides a 50% increase in network performance between data centres in Brazil, Portugal and Spain when compared to routes that had to previously transit through North America, Equinix claims.
Jim Poole, Vice President, Business Development, Equinix, said: "More data is being produced and processed today than ever before—and almost every byte of data that moves over the internet touches a subsea cable. As a result, organisations require access to high-capacity, low-latency networks capable of connecting them to data centres across oceans with the highest levels of reliability.
“This is where Equinix plays a critical role and offers a huge advantage to customers. Any user of a subsea cable network that lands inside one of our global data centre termination points has instant, low-latency access to a host of industry ecosystems inside Equinix,” he added.
Why did Ellalink choose Equinix for the subsea cable project between Latin America and Europe?
EllaLink selected Equinix due to the company's expertise in providing state-of-the-art subsea infrastructure and its access to dense, rich ecosystems of networks, clouds, financial and IT service providers. Equinix serves as an interconnection partner in more than 40 of the current subsea cable projects.
Subsea cables are key to the internet and global connectivity, as 99% of intercontinental traffic crosses a subsea cable with less than 1% of the remaining traffic carried through satellite systems. The global subsea cable market is expected to be valued at US$22bn by 2025, more than doubling from 2019. A significant portion of this growth is in cables connecting Latin America to the rest of the world.
Diego Matas, Chief Operating Officer, EllaLink, said: "Offering one-hop connections between Latin America and Europe with a 60ms latency is a game-changer from a transatlantic latency perspective. During these last months, EllaLink continued working directly with Equinix in order to secure carrier-neutral connections from our PoP locations in Equinix's data centres and we are now enabling our customers to directly access the rich ecosystems of networks, clouds, and financial and IT service providers that Equinix hosts."