FLAG Telecom, Lanka Bell sign pact for undersea cable link to Maldives

Mumbai: FLAG Telecom, part of the Reliance Anil Dhriubhani Ambani Group (ADAG), has signed a $27 million deal with Sri Lanka's Lanka Bell to lay an undersea cable connecting the two countries with neighbouring Maldives.

The project is expected to take about a year to complete, Lanka Bell's director Damien Fernando has said.

Sri Lanka Telecom currently has undersea cable links through the SEA-ME-WE (South East Asia Middle East and Western Europe) consortium while Sri Lanka's Dialog Telekom currently routes its overseas traffic through its parent company Telekom Malaysia.

India's country's largest telecom company, the public sector Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), is already operating its fibre submarine cable system that connects Tiruchchendur in Tamil Nadu to the Lankan capital Colombo.

Lanka Bell started off in 1997, with a licence to provide fixed line services using wireless local loop technology. Last year, Lanka Bell rolled out a $40 million expansion plan to connect rural Sri Lanka using low cost CDMA (Code division multiple access) technology on the 800 MHz band. Lanka Bell's customer base is over 300,000 now.

FLAG owns and manages an extensive optical fibre network spanning four continents and connecting key business markets in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and the US.

FLAG Telecom has an established customer base of more than 180 leading operators, including all of the top ten international carriers. FLAG owns and manages an extensive optical fibre network spanning four continents and connecting key business markets in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and the USA.

FLAG also owns and operates a low latency global MPLS based IP network, which connects most of the world's principal international Internet exchanges. FLAG offers a focused range of global products, including global bandwidth, IP, internet, Ethernet and co-location services.