The Russian Communications Ministry plans to hold a tender for the right to obtain subsidies to build a second underwater fiber-optic communications line to Crimea in the coming months.
“Another cable is needed, mainly to provide for the redundancy of the existing one. Crimea already has much more backbone capacity than it needs, given its area and population density,” Deputy Communications Minister Dmitry Alkhazov told Interfax.
“We expect the cable will go into service in 2017. We plan to announce a tender in the coming months, this year,” he said.
Subsidies for the fiber-optic line’s construction will be allocated by closed tender among operators with licenses to provide voice and data services in Crimea and Sevastopol. The subsidies will over up to 80 percent of the cost of laying the line. Alkhazov did not say how much he thought the project would cost. Communications Minister Nikolai Nikiforov said in August last year that the subsidy might amount to 400 million rubles.
“You can see what is going on with the foreign currency. Unfortunately it is in these underwater systems that we still depend on imported technology, so I wouldn’t want to say exactly what the capital cost might be. But we still think that for whoever wins there’ll be some interest in taking part in a project that is more of a state project than a commercial one, even if the economics are not extraordinarily attractive,” Alkhazov said, adding that he did not yet know who might bid at the tender.
“I won’t conceal the fact that the financial state of bidders will be one of the key parameters. A company with an unsatisfactory financial state might not be able to complete our order from the point of view of timing, above all, because we’d like to ensure redundancy for Crimea as quickly as possible,” he said.
The reserve fiber optic line will connect the Taman Peninsula with the Crimean Peninsula across the Kerch Strait. Its capacity will be at least 200 GB/s. After it goes into operation, the capacity of the communication channels supporting the operation of the communications networks in the Crimean Federal District and Sevastopol within the unified telecommunication network of the Russian Federation will amount to no less than 310 GB/s.
The construction of the communication line will provide for the redundancy of communication channels to ensure the functioning of the networks in Crimea and Sevastopol within the unified telecommunication network of the Russian Federation; the ability to establish communication channels with increased capacity, including special communications; broadband Internet access, telephony and television in the Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol, says a government decree on the line’s construction, signed by Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev.
National telecommunications operator OJSC Rostelecom finished building the first 46-kilometer fiber-optic line to Crimea in April 2014. The line goes from Rostelecom Yug, Rostelecom’s regional subsidiary, to Kerch and includes an above- and underwater portion. The second line will likely extend along another route and have higher capacity and reliability, Nikiforov said.
Rostelecom chief Sergei Kalugin has said the company did not want to be in the frame for the contract to build the second line. He said the ‘Big Three’ cellular providers were interested in that.
Transtelecom (TTC) has also said it is interested in the project. “We have a lot of experience at laying lines like this. An underwater line from Sakhalin to Hokkaido is already in service. We’ll begin with consultations, because there’s not only an underwater section [of cable] needed there under the strait. It’s important that networks reach the main cities [of Crimea], where traffic is concentrated,” TTC’s president, Artem Kudryavtsev, has said.
