Gov’t pursues internet backbone project

The Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) will pursue a plan to build its own nationwide internet backbone, a ranking official said on Monday.

Denis Villorente, DICT undersecretary for special concerns, said under study was the expansion of a government-owned backbone following last year’s agreement with National Transmission Corp. and National Grid Corporation of the Philippines for the use of their spare fiber assets.

“The backbone should land in all of the provinces in the Philippines,” Villorente told reporters on the sidelines of the National ICT Summit 2019.

The plan, part of the DICT’s National Broadband Project, involves laying down new undersea cables from Luzon to Visayas and then Mindanao. These will complement existing undersea cables already in place and also act as backup infrastructure.

Villorente said the project would increase NGCP and Transco’s existing fiber backbone to 10,000 kilometers from the existing 6,000 km. The backbone, which could support the needs of small internet service providers and even the country’s third mobile player, Mislatel Consortium, could be built “within” a P10-billion budget, he said.

A study on how the project will be implemented is yet to be finalized, Villorente noted.

In February, the DICT secured a P24-million grant from the US Trade and Development Agency. He said the agency financed a detailed engineering study that would be finished by the first quarter of 2019.

An international undersea cable being built by global companies such as social media giant Facebook will also provide inexpensive internet to the Philippines by next year. The cable, spanning 12,900-km from the United States to Hong Kong, will land in the Philippines through Baler in Aurora and in Poro Point in San Fernando, La Union.

In line with the national broadband project, the DICT signed earlier this year an agreement with a unit of China’s HyalRoute Group. It formalized the agreement through a partnership with HyalRoute’s local subsidiary, Philippine Fiber Optic Cable Network Ltd. Inc. (PFOCN).

Under the partnership, the DICT said PFOCN would invest up to $2 billion to roll out fiber optic cables from 2019 through 2029. For its part, the DICT will provide assistance to PFOCN in procuring the needed permits and licenses.