At this year’s Pacific Telecommunications Council conference, I spent some time talking through TeleGeography’s latest pricing research findings and tackling the most common questions we've received over the past year.
In case you missed it, here's a recap of my Taylor Swift-themed presentation: Global Pricing Trends in a New Era.
The Latin American Satellite Congress held in Rio de Janeiro at the end of September provided a great opportunity to engage with some of the largest satellite communication companies in the world.
Looking back, there was one common theme that stood out: collaboration.
As we at TeleGeography have noted many times, the vast majority of global connectivity passes through submarine cables. But satellite networks are growing ever more important, both as complements to terrestrial systems and as last resorts for where it is hard (or expensive) to lay fiber.
For enterprises, that means a hybrid Wide Area Network (WAN) combining satellite and terrestrial connectivity is increasingly relevant.
Earlier this week, I joined Ciena and Telstra for a live webinar highlighting Asia-Pacific market drivers, trends, and new cable builds.
During my session, which focused on Trans-Pacific submarine cable trends, content providers came up quite a bit.
These companies prioritize the need to link their data centers and major interconnection points. As such, they often deploy massive amounts of capacity on core routes.
The Trans-Pacific and Intra-Asia routes are two great examples.
Last month, the TeleGeography team joined scores of ICT infrastructure professionals in National Harbor, Maryland for International Telecommunications Week.
One of the many topics discussed was price erosion in Latin America. The main trend likely comes as no surprise: prices keep falling. But there is nuance to how price erosion is occurring in different markets.
Let’s explore the context in more detail.
At SubOptic 2023, my colleague Tim Stronge and I brought back the Telecom Mythbusters to test a new series of myths. I already covered my first two myths from our presentation: the cable lifespan myth and the 99% myth.
My third and final myth—the exponential growth myth—is based upon a quote that I found: “The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function.” –Albert Allen Bartlett
“Submarine cables account for over 99% of intercontinental data traffic” is regularly quoted in the press with no source given.
It’s time for some fact-checking.
The global data center market is under an unprecedented squeeze as we move into 2023.
On one hand, we have a long-term challenge surrounding the sustainability of the industry’s growth trajectory in essential hub markets. On the other, we have an acute short-term problem with energy prices in the colocation sector.
These issues combine to create an uncomfortable phase in the market right now.
Twenty years ago, the United States was very much at the center of the global internet.
In 2003, 98% of all interregional internet capacity and 42% of all international internet bandwidth was connected to the U.S. despite emerging intraregional capacity in Europe and Asia.
Submarine cables helped to enforce this centrality, and the highest capacity cables were connected to the U.S. Around this time, the U.S. was also among the cheapest places to connect to the internet.
So what’s happened to the U.S.’s role? Is the U.S. becoming less centric to the global network?
Historically, the two most predictable trends in the bandwidth market have been consistent demand growth and price erosion. But those trends have been challenged over the past few years.
Recent supply chain issues and geopolitical challenges have dramatically slowed price erosion globally. For the first time, we're asking ourselves, are prices actually increasing?
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