Subsea cable systems play an integral role in today’s communications, serving as the primary backbone to transport data, video and voice traffic globally. Spanning continent to continent, and across the world’s oceans, subsea cables are the foundation in which content is served up, videos are viewed, phone calls are made, social media is posted and businesses operate. And despite popular perception, more than 95 percent of all U.S. international voice, data, and Internet traffic travels by submarine cable. Submarine cables provide higher quality, more reliable, more secure, and less expensive communications than satellites provide.

The physical point in which subsea cables make landfall is at a Cable Landing Station (CLS). It is at these critical network junctures where the cable is brought from the ocean into a terrestrial hub and then broken out into terrestrial fiber paths to connect with metro and long haul routes. Carriers, content and service providers, as well as enterprises and financials are all clamoring to be closer to the edge, which means – closer to where the cable is physically accessed to avoid unnecessary points of failure.

While subsea cable systems have been around since the 1850’s, the landscape of today’s Cable Landing Stations and their role are rapidly changing. Gil Santaliz, CEO and Founder of NJFX, believes the future of Cable Landing Stations lies within the ecosystem effect where a healthy density of diverse networks is created and attracts other infrastructure development. NJFX, known as Tier 3 by the Subsea, offers a Subsea Exchange ecosystem, which combines the right number of carriers participating in a marketplace to interexchange capacity. This offers the capability of tapping into the network at the Cable Landing Station, which can in turn lower latencies, increase speeds, increase capacity options and remove single points of failure.

”When a campus has resiliency, redundancy and also the capability for tenants to now have a choice of using shared services or not – or remain completely separate in a hardened facility – you’ve got a good combination. It’s a unique ecosystem-type approach,“ says Amy Marks, CEO of XSite Modular, a design-builder of Cable Landing Stations. “There are only so many routes you can go through. But what NJFX is doing in terms of creating diverse routes to and from a protected campus is really the perfect solution and quite innovative.”

A Cable Landing Station that is located at a coastal, terrestrial, secure site with high elevation, reliable power and direct accessibility to multiple backhaul providers is crucial, and exactly what NJFX offers. Santaliz believes this combination of ingredients will be hard to achieve in the future and why NJFX is uniquely positioned. NJFX is the result of the innovation of the world’s first colocation campus that strategically intersects a carrier-neutral subsea cable landing station meet-me room with a Tier 3, carrier-neutral data center. Its facility is a 64,800-square foot purpose-built data center, which offers direct access to multiple independent subsea cable systems that interconnect North America, Europe, and South America.

There is a definite need for networks to interconnect, and the benefits of the Tier 3 CLS campus infrastructure include having multiple operationally independent builds, each with two sets of independent bores to the ocean that are miles apart, and with two independent buildings. Additional benefits include:

• Tier 3 concurrently maintainable systems
• Location proven to withstand natural disasters at 65 feet above sea level
• Multiple Points of Points entry
• Eight independent fiber based providers
• Multiple independent meet-me rooms supported by audited Department of Homeland Security standards

All of this is enclosed in a fenced campus which has independent access roads, further providing a secure solution.

Bypassing the typical telecom route through NYC metro, NJFX offers a smart way for organizations to plan their network architectures with resiliency. In addition, NJFX’s close proximity to a power substation further ensures high reliability. “Cable Landing Stations and cable operators need extremely reliable power, as evidenced by the issues from some of the 2017 hurricanes, which caused outages lasting for weeks,” comments Santaliz. “Data centers and carrier hotels are not meant to run on generators for that long. In times of disaster, power utilities have to be turned back on as fast as possible.”

Crosslake Fibre is using a high fiber count submarine cable from NJFX to reach an independent Cable Landing Station on Long Island bypassing NYC, which further increases network diversity and resilience. “The power of being able to cost-effectively shift traffic across different TransAtlantic routes is now possible, because of new connectivity options,” comments Mike Cunningham, CEO of Crosslake Fibre. “These new routes, like the Wall-LI cable, can be segments within larger mesh networks enabling flexibility and necessary resilience around Tier 3 infrastructure.”

Massive bandwidth demands and the need for highly reliable network infrastructure are driving the need to locate multiple subsea cable systems in one place. “There are huge economies of scale in this model,” continues Santaliz. “Operators are recognizing that it’s extremely hard to have all of these elements – elevation, backhaul optionality, and power in one place. A carrier-neutral CLS allows for a best of breed community versus the traditional monopoly carrier landlord model and paves the way for the new economy.”

For more information and to learn more about the changing subsea cable landscape, visit www.njfx.net.

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About XSite Modular

XSite Modular is the most well-known and prolific design-builder of cable landing stations. XSite stations are built in a controlled environment with experienced labor forces while their process provides design flexibility to meet clients’ requirements, both technically and aesthetically. Unlike containers, XSite’s modular building process provides large column free spaces with gracious ceiling heights for ease of equipment installation.

XSite’s design-build process dramatically reduces project schedules and provides cost certainty from the earliest concept phases through completion. XSite utilizes an engineered, optimized and productized approach that is easily customized for clients’ specific telecom DC power requirements and space/program needs. This transformational approach allows us to dramatically reduce risk for clients by providing a turnkey landing station to deliver time-sensitive, critical infrastructure to often challenging locations.

XSite has worked on six of the seven continents in both urban and remote locations on systems including ECLink, CFX-1, SEACOM, Matrix, Fibralink, TGN Pacific G6, Seabras-1, Hawaiian Telcom Makaha CLS (SEA-US), Atisa and SPM.  XSite also provides PFE shelters, ILA huts, modular data centers and all types of terrestrial telecommunications buildings. For more information on XSite Modular, please visit http://www.xsitemodular.com

About Crosslake Fibre

Crosslake Fibre was established to develop fibre-optic projects throughout North America.  Crosslake’s innovative approach to developing next-generation networks will bring new backbone routes to telecommunications carriers and web-centric customers, and last mile broadband to consumers.  Crosslake Fibre’s leading project is its Lake Ontario project to construct a new subsea cable from Toronto, Canada to Buffalo, New York.  For additional information, see www.crosslakefibre.ca.

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About NJFX:

NJFX is a Tier 3 Carrier Neutral Cable Landing Station campus. Our colocation ecosystem has expanded to over 35 network operators offering flexibility, reliability, and security. Our Wall, NJ location provides direct access to multiple subsea cable systems giving our carriers diverse connectivity solutions and offers direct interconnection without recurring cross-connect fees.