PLDT sees faster internet in 2020

Industry giant PLDT Inc. expects faster internet speeds in the Philippines with the completion of a new transpacific submarine cable by the third quarter of 2020.

PLDT said the 14,000-kilometer United States-Japan-Philippines cable called Jupiter would add new internet capacity for customers in the Philippines. It will land in Daet, Camarines Norte.

PLDT invested P7 billion to join Jupiter’s global consortium that includes US tech giants Facebook and Amazon as well as Japanese firms SoftBank and NTT Group, a shareholder of PLDT, and PCCW Global, part of Hong Kong’s PCCW Group.

“This project will enable us to further improve the capacity and resilience of the country’s international connectivity and thus continue to deliver unparalleled world-class internet service to our customers,” PLDT chief revenue officer Alfredo Panlilio said in a statement on Wednesday.

PLDT said Jupiter would provide additional capacity of over 22 terabits per second from the Philippines to Japan and 17.6 Tbps to the US West Coast.

The global internet backbone is powered by thousands of kilometers of submarine cables transferring data between servers around the world.

In the case of Jupiter, Panlilio said it would answer growing demand for content in Japan and in particular, the United States, with Filipinos accessing massive amounts of data from companies like Facebook.

These also serve crucial business customers in the Philippines, considered a global business process outsourcing hub. Jupiter provides more international internet connection options for PLDT’s business customers, said Juan Victor Hernandez, head of PLDT and Smart Enterprise Business Group.