PLDT invests USD 80 million in new submarine cable system APRICOT

Industry giant PLDT is investing anew in an international undersea cable system as it aims to further bolster network bandwidth capacity.

PLDT spending PHP 3.9 billion to build APRICOT

PLDT invests in a new undersea cable system

The telco giant on Monday said it joined an international consortium to build a 12,000-kilometer submarine cable system, dubbed APRICOT.

The group, for its part, is set to spend USD 80 million or PHP 3.9 billion.

We continue to invest in international submarine cable systems, which are necessary infrastructure for global communications supporting ICT services, said PLDT and Smart Communications president and chief executive officer, Alfredo S. Panlilio.

The undersea cable system will connect the Philippines to Japan, Singapore, Indonesia, Taiwan, and Guam. Part of the plan is to build new cable landing stations in Luzon and Mindanao, PLDT noted.

The construction of this APRICOT cable system is vital to the Philippine economy with rapidly increasing data traffic and is aligned with our efforts to make the Philippines a strategic data center hub in the region, Panlilio added.

As APRICOT is designed to deliver a capacity of more than 190 terabits per second, PLDT said this will support the group to meet the growing demand for data.

APRICOT is being eyed to be up and running by 2024.