China Mobile Limited and China Telecom Corporation Limited have withdrawn from the Southeast Asia-Middle East-West Europe 6 (Sea-Me-We 6) subsea cable project between Singapore and France. Combined investment of both the companies accounted for 20 per cent of the total project cost.
The 19,200 km long system will be built with 10 fibre pairs, with a total capacity of 126 Tbps. The optical-fibre cable system will span across 12 initial countries, including Singapore, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Maldives, India, Pakistan, Djibouti, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt.
The entire project is estimated to cost around USD500 million, and the cable system will come online in 2025.