A new 15,000km high-speed transmission cable of the largest capacity will be completed in 2024 and will link Singapore to North America across the Pacific Ocean.
The subsea Bifrost Cable System is a regional internet infrastructure project and will boost digital connectivity and offer network diversity between Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines, Guam and the west coast of North America.
The project will be developed by Keppel Telecommunications & Transportation, Facebook, and Telekomunikasi Indonesia International, a subsidiary of Indonesia's Telkom telecommunication and network service provider.
This is the first subsea cable project undertaken by Keppel.
The companies said in a joint press release on March 29 that the undersea cable system will offer direct connectivity between Southeast Asia and North America to cater to the rising connectivity needs of this region.
"With global data bandwidth demands reaching unprecedented levels, surging cloud adoption, exponential growth in mobile device usage and 5G deployment, the demand for more bandwidth highlights the critical impact subsea cables have on global connectivity," the release said.
But this will not be the only project Facebook has a hand in.
Facebook is also involved in another submarine cable project with Google, Bloomberg reported on March 30.
The Echo subsea cable will be the first to link Singapore directly to the U.S., with stops at Indonesia and Guam en route to Eureka, California, Google said.
That fiber link is expected to be operational in 2023 and increase bandwidth substantially.
The undersea cables will boost operations of Google and Facebook, which have data centres in Singapore.