ARTICLE - SUBMARINE FIBER OPTIC CABLE NETWORK

BTC TO EXPAND SUBMARINE FIBER OPTIC CABLE NETWORK
(The Nassau Guardian) - By Inderia Saunders

'Millions' to be invested in expansion

The Bahamas Telecommunications Company (BTC) is planning an expansion of its $6 million submarine fiber optic cables, Guardian Business can confirm — a move set to maximize revenue at the company.

“We are going to make a significant investment into expanding the capacity of the Miami cable,” BTC chief executive Geoff Houston confirmed. “And we’re looking at investing on expanding the capacity of the Haiti cable.

“We expect to be able to do both of those this year and that will provide new sources of revenue opportunity for the company.”

In 2006, BTC ran a submarine fiber optic cable to the expanding Haiti market through a partnership arrangement with phone company Teleco D’Haiti, transmitting data traffic out of Haiti into The Bahamas and from The Bahamas to the U.S. The Bahamas Domestic Submarine Network is a high-tech, underwater highway that BTC had a lock on as the owner of the only cable of its kind terminating in Haiti.

By all estimates as many as three million residents use cell phones in Haiti and getting communication in and out of the country has been key in the last several years.

Houston said BTC was in a good position to facilitate that communication.

“If you’re in Haiti for example and you want to get off the island, you can come via our Haiti link into Miami and out,” he explained to Guardian Business. “We would sell capacity to those carriers in Haiti and, similarly, carriers looking to get into Haiti, we would sell them capacity going the other way.

“So it’s quite a significant opportunity, given that there aren’t many others providing those services into Haiti, so the business is in a unique position to provide those services [and] we are just going to try and leverage that position more.”

While he wouldn’t provide a specific investment amount, Houston said it would definitely be a “few million.” The determining factor would depend on the capacity of the new cables, which BTC is currently still trying to finalize.

The cable itself - which runs from Inagua to Haiti’s holding point - was affected in 2010’s deadly earthquake when the center that houses the operating equipment was damaged. Connectivity has since been restored.

Cable and Wireless Communications, which recently purchased 51 percent of BTC, outlined in its business plan intentions to maximize “opportunities of The Bahamas-Haiti cable link tapping into CWC’s global carrier services business.”

However, it won’t be without competition. Digicel has tapped into that market and boasted around 500,000 customers in its first year, according to reports. Their customer base has grown to around 2.6 million customers in Haiti.