Fb’s father or mother firm Meta mentioned it’s engaged on the world’s longest undersea cable as a part of the social media big’s efforts to attach extra folks to high-speed web.
Known as Challenge Waterworth, the huge cable spanning greater than 50,000 kilometers will deliver “industry-leading connectivity” to the USA, India, Brazil, South Africa and different areas, Meta mentioned.
“This venture will allow better financial cooperation, facilitate digital inclusion, and open alternatives for technological growth in these areas,” Meta mentioned in a weblog put up on Feb. 14.
Meta expects the multibillion-dollar venture might be accomplished towards the tip of the last decade, however didn’t present a particular yr or estimates of how a lot it can price.
Tech leaders together with Meta, Google, Amazon and Microsoft have been investing closely in undersea cables for years as a method to supply extra reasonably priced and dependable web throughout the globe. As extra folks hook up with the web to speak and stream movies, these investments additionally permit tech corporations to draw extra customers to their providers.
An estimated 95% of worldwide web visitors travels by way of subsea cables, making them the spine of the web, in response to a 2024 report from the World Digital Inclusion Partnership.
Like different main tech corporations, the social community has been ramping up efforts to construct extra synthetic intelligence-powered instruments that may generate textual content, photos and different content material. Meta mentioned in its weblog put up that its 24 fiber pair cable venture “will help be sure that the advantages of AI and different rising applied sciences can be found to everybody, no matter the place they stay or work.”
The corporate mentioned it has developed greater than 20 subsea cables with companions over the past decade. A few of Meta’s undersea cables have included 2Africa Pearls, connecting Africa, Europe and Asia, and Marea, connecting the USA with Spain.
Greater than 3 billion folks use one among Meta’s apps day by day, which embody Fb, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger.
The enlargement of undersea cables to supply web and telecommunications has additionally heightened issues that the infrastructure might be focused throughout geopolitical conflicts.
Final yr, underwater cables within the Crimson Sea, mendacity between Africa and Asia, have been lower and disrupted web service. It was unclear how the cables have been broken and Yemen’s Houthi rebels denied attacking the traces to stress Israel to finish its warfare on Hamas in Gaza, the Related Press reported.
Meta’s newest investments additionally come as its Chief Government Mark Zuckerberg tries to fix a strained relationship with President Trump, who he’s beforehand sparred with over immigration points and content material moderation. This yr, Meta ended its third-party fact-checking program, relying as a substitute on customers to write down notes beneath deceptive posts, and rolled again DEI efforts that Trump has criticized.
Zuckerberg additionally praised Trump in Meta’s quarterly earnings name in January, noting that his administration “prioritizes American know-how profitable” and has visited the president on the White Home.
Final week, the White Home talked about Meta’s undersea cable venture in a joint assertion from President Trump and India’s Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi about how the 2 nations are working collectively.
Meta’s venture, the assertion mentioned, would “strengthen world digital highways” within the Indian Ocean and India plans to spend money on the upkeep, restore and financing of those undersea cables.