Science and Technology › Communications
Telecom networks, spectrum and internet infrastructure
Telecom networks and the physical internet: mobile generations and spectrum, telecom law and its regulator, rural broadband, fibre, subsea cables and their landing stations, and the rules of the net. It serves GS3 answers on infrastructure and communications.
28 Aug 2026 · Prelims
Cable landing stations
A country's link to the rest of the internet is physical, and narrower than it looks: a few fibre cables lying on the seabed, each of which has to come ashore somewhere. Those few coastal points are where its entire international capacity is concentrated.
- Almost all traffic between countries travels on subsea cables rather than by satellite.
- A cable comes ashore at a cable landing station, which joins it to the domestic network.
- Data centres cluster near a landing station, because content stored close to the cable reaches users with the least delay.
28 Aug 2026 · Prelims
Visakhapatnam gateway
Most of the cables on India's east coast are old and nearly full, and instability in West Asia is pushing operators towards routes that avoid it. Visakhapatnam is where both pressures are being answered, with two new systems due to land there.
- The 3,600 km India–Southeast Asia (I-2SEA) system is expected to be ready for service by late 2029.
- Google's America-India Connect is the other system planned for the same landing.
- Andhra Pradesh's data centre buildout came first, and the new cables are following it to the coast.