The NCP consortium, comprised of China Mobile, China Telecom, China Unicom, Chunghwa Telecom, KT Corporation, Microsoft, SoftBank Mobile Corp, and TE SubCom, a TE Connectivity Ltd. company, announced that the New Cross Pacific (NCP) Cable Network has started construction.

Spanning more than 13,000 km, the NCP Cable Network will link Hillsboro, Oregon (U.S.A.) with connectivity to Chongming (China mainland), Nanhui (China mainland), Lingang (China mainland), Busan (South Korea), Toucheng (Taiwan), and Maruyama (Japan). The 100G repeatered cable system will deliver up to 80 Tbps of capacity.

“The construction commencement of the NCP cable marks a significant moment for Microsoft and the consortium partners,” said Dave Crowley, Managing Director of Microsoft’s Global Network Procurement.

“TE SubCom is honored to play a key role in a project that will help to provide the infrastructure necessary in such a growing technological region of the world,” said Aaron Stucki, President of TE SubCom.

NCP will be designed to interconnect with other cable systems in the region to maximize the throughput of data, as well as to support future upgrades, with the expectation for the service to launch in late 2017.