This infrastructure has been buttressed by the country’s excellent subsea cable connectivity, which includes the Tasman Global Access Cable linking Auckland and Sydney (providing an alternative path for traffic carried by the Tasman-2 and Southern Cross cables). The company SCCN has also initiated work on the Southern Cross NEXT cable, running between Sydney, Auckland, and Los Angeles. The 12,250km system is scheduled for completion by mid-2022, and has a design capacity of 72Tb/s.
In mid-2018 the cable developer Hawaiki completed its cable linking Australia, New Zealand, and Hawaii to the US wst coast at Oregon. More recently, Google has started laying the 240Tb/s Topaz cable, which will link Canada (at Vancouver) with Honolulu, Sydney, and Auckland. In addition, the Chilean company Desarrollo Pais in January 2022 contracted H2 to build the 14,810km Humboldt cable connecting Valparaiso (Chile) to Auckland and Sydney. This cable is expected to be lit in early 2025.
Key developments:
Google to lay the Topaz cable connecting Canada with Honolulu, Sydney, and Auckland;
Trustpower sells its retail business to Mercury NZ for NZ$441 million;
Trilogy International sells 2degrees;
New Zealand to be connected to Australia and Chile via the 14,810km Humboldt cable in early 2025;
Chorus begins closing down copper network as it transitions to an all-fibre network;
Government allocates 3.5GHz spectrum after Covid-19 crisis forces cancellation of a planned 5G auction;
Spark extends the reach of its 5G service; stops providing PSTN services;
2degrees’ network covering 98.5% of the population;
Report update includes ComCom and Statistics New Zealand data for 2020, operator data to March 2022, recent market developments.
