Seaborn Networks, Grupo Werthein to connect Argentina and Brazil via submarine cable

April 4, 2017

Submarine cable system operator Seaborn Networks and Argentine investment company Grupo Werthein say they plan to create a new undersea cable network that will connect Argentina and Brazil. The submarine network, dubbed ARBR, will offer onward connectivity to the United States via Seaborn's Seabras-1 submarine fiber-optic network.

The ARBR system will be a four-fiber-pair system with an initial maximum design capacity of 48 Tbps. The partners expect to complete deployment of the undersea network in the second half of 2018. The submarine network will land in Brazil at the Seabras-1 cable landing station in Praia Grande, which will enable the direct onward connectivity to New York on Seabras-1. The Argentine landing for ARBR is expected to be in or near Las Toninas.

Seabras Group (an affiliate of Seabras), which owns Seabras-1, will also develop, own, and operate the ARBR system. The combined deployment costs of the ARBR and Seabras-1 submarine cables exceeds $575 million, Seaborn says.

"We are very pleased to announce our agreement with Grupo Werthein to build and operate the ARBR system," said Larry Schwartz, chairman and CEO of both Seaborn Networks and Seabras Group. "This project responds to the Argentine market need for substantially more international capacity on a next-generation system while also offering the country's first independent operator model for a critical submarine cable route."

"Given that it has been 16 years since the last submarine cable was built from Argentina to Brazil, combined with the fact that this is the primary route for data and voice communications between Argentina and the rest of the world, this new and independent route is overdue," added Dario Werthein of Grupo Werthein.

"Argentina needs a global modernization of communications infrastructure, and this first independent submarine cable system is a very important step for that purpose," commented Argentine Communications Minister Oscar Aguad. "We are on the path of economic transformation of the country. This great project is the result of the new rules of the game that we promote, which, by providing predictability and legal security, allow the necessary conditions for companies to invest on a large scale with new projects in the country."

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