WASHINGTON – Google has applied to the US regulator for a license to build a 6,900-kilometer submarine fiber-optic cable, which will be anchored in the Azores and Sines, claiming it will be the first direct link between the United States and Portugal.
According to the document, which Portugal’s Lusa news agency had access on Thursday, the multinational is asking the Federal Communications Commission for “a license to build, anchor and operate a private, non-common fiber-optic submarine cable system linking the United States to Bermuda, the Azores and mainland Portugal”.
Google “intends to install and test the cloud system in US waters from the third quarter of 2025 and begin commercial operation of the system’s mooring point in the United States in the second half of 2026,” reads the letter.
The transatlantic cable system is called “Nuvem“, which mean cloud in Portuguese, and will be around 6,900 kilometers long, linking Myrtle Beach in South Carolina to Bermuda, São Miguel in the Azores, and Sines in mainland Portugal.
“Nuvem will be the first system to directly connect the United States to the Azores and mainland Portugal. It will also be the first transatlantic system to have a landing point in Bermuda,” says the company.
“Nuvem will improve network resiliency across the Atlantic, helping meet growing demand for digital services and further establishing its landing locations as digital hubs,” Google said in a recent update.
With regard to the Internet speed benchmark, the company says that each pair of fiber optic cables will have a total projected capacity of approximately 24 tbps (terabit transport per second).
The system, which will consist of 16 pairs of cables, will have a total of 384 tbps.
Google’s request, made on behalf of its subsidiary Starfish, is dated June 21.
This article originally appeared on The Herald News: Google asks to lay transatlantic subsea cable to link U.S. to Portugal