PTCL Commissions Pakistan Operations of 40Tbps AAE-1 Submarine Cable

PTCL today announced the commissioning of Asia-Africa-Europe 1 (AAE-1) cable system that connects South East Asia to Europe via Egypt.

Spanning over 25,000 kms, it is the largest submarine cable to be constructed in almost 15 years.

With a capacity of at least 40 Terabits per second across 5 fiber pairs, AAE-1 is designed from the outset with 100Gbps transmission technology, which may be upgraded in the future to fulfil increasing bandwidth demand.

Salient features of AAE1 are Low Latency, no difference between Trunks or Branch and traffic between any two points is express.

PTCL has been providing fixed line telephony services to the nation for the last 70 years and is also the country’s largest provider of Broadband services. Being Pakistan’s telecommunication backbone, PTCL is already a member of three (03) other international submarine cable consortiums; SMW-3, SMW-4 and IMEWE.

PTCL’s huge investment in AAE-1 demonstrates its commitment to customers for providing a better quality of service via diverse and redundant routes, which no other operator in Pakistan can match.

Further, PTCL will be able to cater for growing bandwidth requirements of its customers to support live streaming and watching HD content over internet, thus furthering its commitment of building a digitally connected Pakistan. Network diversity is a priority in network planning. It is critical to have more than one route; for continuity of services, for security and for efficiency of the network.

PTCL has joined hands with world leading Telecom Operators including China Unicom, CIL (HyalRoute), Djibouti Telecom, Etisalat, GT5L, Mobily, Omantel, Ooredoo, OTEG, PCCW, Reliance Jio, Retelit, Telecom Egypt, TeleYemen, TOT, Viettel, VNPT and VTC to connect Pakistan to Hong Kong, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, with Malaysia and Singapore, then onwards to Myanmar, India, in the East and  Oman, UAE, Qatar, Yemen, Djibouti, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Greece, Italy and France. AAE-1’s completion will not only provide the primary route of choice but also offers protection and diversity to existing vulnerable and heavily congested routes.

AAE-1 is an open access network connecting carrier neutral PoPs in Hong Kong, Singapore, and France where operators can choose their preferred backhaul providers in the PoPs or at the AAE-1 Cable Stations.

It provides reliable connectivity to gateways in Gulf Countries (Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and UAE) and South East Asia (Hong Kong, Malaysia and Thailand), to Africa (Djibouti) and critically diverse subsea connectivity to emerging markets in Myanmar, Pakistan, Thailand, Vietnam and Yemen.


    • No need to be excited. They are taking next 15 years to complete this. Read the whole article closely.

      • you should read it yourself. it’s the longest cable in 15 years. it doesn’t say that it’s going to take 15 years to be laid. it’s already been laid and is ready to be used.

      • Just read the first sentence and it says commissioning, which shortly means added to their system. Now its just a matter of time for us to see the difference.

  • What’s the use of so much bandwidth when internet is still expensive and comparatively slow in the country?

    • because demand is rising and soon supply will too. they will now lower prices across the board. it’ll probably take a year or so for those price cuts to filter down to consumers.

      in case you haven’t noticed everything is more bandwidth intensive now. even your typical web page is over 900KB in size.

      BTW only 20% of the population in jihadistan has internet access which is the lowest in all of south asia. Don’t you think we will need more bandwidth when the rest are connected? Or do you want an electricity like situation where new connections are handed out without upgrading the t&d network or generating enough power?

          • fascism is like the polar opposite of liberal so what you are saying makes no sense. fascism is actually something pakistanis yearn because they feel it will bring order to the chaos.

            i’m in karachi and i call pakistan by many names, jihadistan, banistan, choristan (coz everyone’s a thief) and so on.

  • bhai right now 2 fibers are down (TW1 & SEME4) so if its operation should we get internet live again or it will take time for getting this AAE-1 fully Operational

    • there are 6 in total (including this one) that are operational so 2 down means 4 still up.

      we should also build some land based ones to china. i think it’s a part of the CPEC that the government is not too keen on but the Chinese are pushing for it.

  • Couldn’t understand is it online or goes to construction phase as following mentioned in the article
    “It is the largest submarine cable to be constructed in almost 15 years”

  • If new one is commissioned…why there’s slowness? impact of 2 damaged submarine lines should be less now….but no difference on PTCL so far

  • Can you people write articles more clearly? Is the cable live or are we suppose to wait out for ages? Does this means we are going to get high speed internet at lower prices?

  • Still facing extremely slow internet speed via Wi-Tribe, but Zong 4G is running fast like hell! I have’t seen any effect on the speed if it has been implemented! It would be better if it is told when it will start working!

  • PTCL needs to upgrade it’s infrastructure in major cities on a priority basis now that it has bandwidth to sell. It’s absurd that I can’t get anything besides a copper based DSL in my home at max 8 Mbps despite living within 500 meters of a major PTCL exchange.

    It’s specially telling of how outdated PTCL’s infrastructure is that I pay Rs. 3000 before tax for 8 Mbps (1 Mbps up) unlimited DSL (my backup connection) while I pay Rs. 4800 before tax for my 200 Mbps (200 Mbps up) unlimited FTTH connection (which happens to double to 400 Mbps during nights).

    That’s 25 times more bandwidth for only 1.6 times the price. PTCL needs to at least start offering a 100 Mbps FTTH connection for around Rs. 5000.

        • arey yar mere area mein available nai warna mein abhi isse waqt laga laita. 40 mb wala package sahe hai mere liye raat ko 80 mb hojayega. mujhe tez upload ke zarorat hai jo ptcl wale to kabhie dream mein be nai desakhte.

          • Very true. 40 MB is more than enough for most needs. Hopefully these companies spread their operations across all major areas.

  • Lets see if it makes any difference in Latency because so far.. No difference noticed

      • They are offering in limited areas where they have upgraded their network, in Gujranwala they are offering in Citi Housing, Wapda Town, Satellite Town, Model Town, DC Road. I was using 8mbos in 3000 yesterday ordered 20mb have received confirmation that order have been processed username upgraded, port will be upgraded tomorrow. My cousin who was using 12mb ordered 50mb but was told that connection of 50mb and 100mb are provided over vdsl after survey.

    • I just call 0800 people and they said that there is no new promotion or even double speed.

      • They are offering in limited areas where they have upgraded their network, in Gujranwala they are offering in Citi Housing, Wapda Town, Satellite Town, Model Town, DC Road. I was using 8mbos in 3000 yesterday ordered 20mb have received confirmation that order have been processed username upgraded, port will be upgraded tomorrow. My cousin who was using 12mb ordered 50mb but was told that connection of 50mb and 100mb are provided over vdsl after survey.

        • I’m also using 8mb package for 3000 and my area and line does support till 25mb. I’m on ONU backend fiber.


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