This Thursday, President Gabriel Boric announced the finalization of the signing Humboldt Cable Project, a public-private partnership between the state and Google to build an underwater optical signature that would link South America and the Asia-Pacific. Luz Granier, president of the Desarrollo País board, and Patricio Rey, general manager of the state company started a strategic alliance Along with the tech giants, they revealed more details of the initiative in their conversations with Pulso.
It is estimated that this submarine cable Construction will begin later this year. In 2025 it will be established and It will open in 2026.
“We are asserting ourselves as a vehicle that manages to achieve public-private partnerships for the development of the country's infrastructure. Through this alliance with Google, it will allow us to bring technology Very high quality Chile must be transformed into a digital hub. We've negotiated with Google through 2023, and it's important that you trust us. Now coming Signing and negotiating various documents What does this mean? The construction of this cable comes, which is not done in the journey itself. It's built in a factory, and when it's ready, it's put on a ship and the ship starts voting according to a layout,” Grenier said.
Ray added, “By the end of this year Production begins, and operation begins in the first half of 2026. In the meantime, we need to build the landing stations and the necessary infrastructure to make it work.
On the other hand, they explained that the commercial phase is just beginning. There will be cable 16 pairs of hairs 14 of them are from Google, and two other pairs 50% Country Development and 50% Google.
“Throughout 2023 we are negotiating the business model with Google. “We've got great news that this corporate structure relies on Google's country's growth to improve,” Grenier said.
Also, country development managers explained why Google was chosen to develop the project.
“In 2022 We made an international call For various companies who want to participate in the leadership of a company Participated with uss. That process was not fruitful in acquiring strategic partners. We saw it once The process was not successful We started direct negotiations with Google. This route connecting Asia Pacific was deserted and there were no other cables. Demand generation should be encouraged. Getting Google to join this initiative is our biggest achievement. (We are) proud that this route reaches Chile through the south,” Grenier said.
Meanwhile, the general manager noted, “In the first operation We partner with a company to carry out continuous processes. Among those activities We are going to do that with this partner, the most important is marketing. We should have enough Number of stackers, must have sufficient critical mass to enable this infrastructure. In this process, we were unable to achieve the minimum volume established as sales prior to launch. That's why we couldn't reach a conclusion with that New Zealand company. By not succeeding in the customer process, because it was a new path, when we already had it Negative feedback from many potential customers, this started to make sense to Google, and it made more and more business sense for them. We had a conversation with them beforehand and they came back to us and expressed their interest in participating, which made the opportunity to do the project even more feasible.
A consider cable The initial investment is USD 55 million. They highlighted that since the development of the country, these types of initiatives are beyond the state and governments.
“The idea was born in 2018, where Subtel initiated the project. Funding is being received from CAF to carry out initial studies. In 2019, the project was transferred to us as a company to continue studying and developing it. Between 2020-2021 we will complete the studies in more detail, then start international calling in 2022 and sign the contract in 2023. I would like to highlight that infrastructure works are government works that transcend a government. This project started during the government of President Piñera. It was negotiated and the Contracts in this GovtAnd it will be inaugurated in the third government,” Grenier said.
Already thinking about the future, Ray explained, “We have to do everything we develop Along with business strategy The future we want to manifest. You have to go Finalization of letters There were and concrete participation interest. We need to look for an operator in a deterministic way, Because neither Google nor Desarrollo País are operators Cable technicians or skill salespeople. We need to find a third party to help us in this process and successfully market this cable. In short, there are several phases to be completed, such as construction, constitution of the company and search for an operator.
This project is about digital internet connection cable The sea is 14,800 kilometers From the coast of the Valparaiso region to Sydney Harbour, Australia.
