Asia Netcom has signed an agreement with NEC to double the capacity on the southern segment of its Pan-Asian submarine cable system, EAC.

The EAC system spans 19,500 km within Asia connecting Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Philippines, Singapore, Hong Kong and soon, mainland China.

The upgrade on the EAC2 ring of the system, which spans Hong Kong, Singapore, the Philippines, Taiwan, will raise the bandwidth capacity on those routes to 160 Gbps.

This will be the third incremental capacity expansion this year for Asia Netcom. Previous upgrades have already more than doubled the capacity on the northern segment of the EAC system.

According to a Telegeography report in April this year, the global bandwidth market is showing signs of improved health, with supply equilibrium and price stability being primary indicators of this trend. This has led many network operators, including Asia Netcom, to light additional wavelengths and fiber pairs on an as-needed basis. This incremental approach to managing spare circuit inventories means that lit bandwidth supply and bandwidth demand are coming into balance.

"The trend forward as more sophisticated applications traverse undersea networks is the steady consumption of bandwidth. This is matched by the stabilizing of prices in the region over the past few months," said Bill Barney, President and CEO, Asia Netcom. "We are confident that this is the upturn the industry has been waiting for."

The additional capacity will support Asia Netcom's extensive service and product portfolio, which includes leading MPLS-based transport and network solutions, a Tier 1 Internet backbone, as well as traditional connectivity solutions such as international private lines and ATM and Frame Relay.