The Republican Unitary Telecommunication Enterprise Beltelecom (Republic of Belarus) and the operator of the new Trans-Eurasian fiber-optic line Atlas (Russian Federation) have signed a memorandum of cooperation. The document was signed by Director General of RUE Beltelecom Aleksei Ivashkin and Director General of Atlas LLC Alexander Ratushny. The venue for signing the strategically important memorandum was the XVI International TransNet Conference, which is currently taking place in Moscow.
The document provides for the participation of RUE Beltelecom in the TEA NEXT project as a partner providing transport infrastructure across the territory of the Republic of Belarus. The memorandum recorded intention of the Parties to ensure a seamless extension of the fiber-optic communication line infrastructure beyond the Russian Federation across the territory of our country with the possibility of further development of the TEA NEXT infrastructure in Europe.
Aleksei Ivashkin, Director General of RUE Beltelecom: “Currently, together with Atlas, we are discussing the technical and organizational aspects of participation in the Trans-Eurasian fiber-optic line project. For Beltelecom, as the largest infrastructure operator in the Republic of Belarus, the TEA NEXT project is strategically important.”
Alexander Ratushny, CEO of Atlas: “We welcome the decision of Beltelecom to ensure a seamless extension of the fiber-optic communication line infrastructure outside the Russian Federation. This decision will significantly increase the backbone transit capabilities of TEA NEXT.”
The TEA NEXT project involves bringing to market a fundamentally new set of services based on the leasing of physical infrastructure for the organization of communication channels between Europe and Asia. The uniqueness of the project is that the TEA NEXT fiber-optic line will provide transit system capabilities that are not available in any of the existing terrestrial lines - while they are widely used in business models of sea submarine intercontinental communication lines. In addition, the construction of TEA NEXT will provide a new fiber-optic communication line used by all major Russian operators.
The construction of the TEA NEXT fiber-optic communication line continues, in the future it will connect the western and eastern borders of Russia with connections to the largest cities of the country and exits to the borders of Russia - Mongolia - China and the land earth station of underwater communications lines in More than 4750 km of the TEA NEXT fiber-optic line route are already ready, taking into account the previously commissioned segments in the European part of Russia. By the end of 2025, it is planned to extend the line to Mongolia and China. In 2026, the entire terrestrial part of the communication line, which is part of the first stage of construction taking place on the territory of Russia, will be completely ready. At the same time, the necessary infrastructure for international line extensions will be provided.
FOR REFERENCE: The design capacity of the new fiber-optic communication line will be 96 dark fibers, which will be used as a transit resource for communication between Asia and Europe and by Russian operators in Russia. At the same time, the TEA NEXT route will be laid along a completely new, optimal route. The project is of particular importance for the connection of the Asian region with Europe, since it will offer a full-fledged reliable alternative to the marine cable systems that are laid through the Indian Ocean and Egypt.
In the construction of the new fiber-optic communication line, optical fibers of category G.654E were used, which are used for the first time for the construction of fiber-optic communication lines in Russia and provide the possibility of organizing the most promising and high-speed optical data transmission channels with a total throughput of 19.2 Tbps per pair of fibers, and can also be used for all promising technologies of DWDM backbone equipment[1].
Atlas LLC was established in 2020 by Rostelecom as a special project company with the aim of implementing the New Trans-Eurasian fiber-optic line (TEA NEXT) project.
DWDM (Dense Wavelength-Division Multiplexing) is a modern technology for transmitting a large number of optical channels over a single fiber, spectral multiplexing of optical communication signals.
