SEA-ME-WE 6 Submarine Cable System
21,700 km mega-cable linking Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Western Europe with over 126 Tbps capacity
Open it on the earth: cut a link, lose a siteWorkbook (DC Sim template v1.4)
The story
The Southeast Asia–Middle East–Western Europe 6 (SEA-ME-WE 6) cable system is a high-capacity optical highway spanning 21,700 kilometers across two oceans and three continents. Constructed by a global carrier consortium including Singtel, Orange, Telecom Egypt, Telekom Malaysia, and Microsoft, the cable uses SubCom SDM technology delivering over 126 Tbps across multiple fiber pairs. Connecting Tuas in Singapore to Marseille in France via the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea corridor, it provides one of the fastest direct data conduits between Asia and Europe.
Notable
- Measures 21,700 kilometers with landings in 12 countries across Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.
- Employs advanced space-division multiplexing (SDM) achieving design capacity exceeding 126 Tbps.
- Designed to offer lower latency between Singapore and Western Europe than prior legacy consortium routes.
- Supported by major tier-1 telcos alongside global hyperscaler consortium member Microsoft.
Sites
| Code | Place | Role | Provider |
|---|---|---|---|
| SIN | Singapore (Tuas), Singapore | landing | Singtel |
| BOM | Mumbai, India | landing | Bharti Airtel |
| DJI | Djibouti City, Djibouti | landing | Djibouti Telecom |
| PSD | Port Said / Zafarana, Egypt | landing | Telecom Egypt |
| MRS | Marseille, France | landing | Orange |
Links
| From | To | Type | Capacity | Length | Year | Protected | Est. one-way latency |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SIN | BOM | submarine | 126 Tbps | 4,200 km | 2025 | no | ≈ 29.3 ms |
| BOM | DJI | submarine | 126 Tbps | 3,600 km | 2025 | no | ≈ 24.6 ms |
| DJI | PSD | submarine | 126 Tbps | 2,400 km | 2025 | no | ≈ 18.4 ms |
| PSD | MRS | submarine | 126 Tbps | 2,800 km | 2025 | no | ≈ 20.4 ms |
Latency marked ≈ is our estimate from the great-circle distance × 1.5 at 5 µs per km, not the operator's figure.
Sources
- SEA-ME-WE 6 Consortium builds multi-terabit subsea cable connecting Southeast Asia and Europe · Singtel · 2022-02-21
- SEA-ME-WE 6 subsea cable lands in Marseille, France · Data Center Dynamics · 2024-05-10
Part of the open famous data centers dataset (CC BY 4.0). Updated 2026-10-15.
What is SEA-ME-WE 6 Submarine Cable System famous for?
21,700 km mega-cable linking Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Western Europe with over 126 Tbps capacity
How many sites and links does SEA-ME-WE 6 Submarine Cable System have in this dataset?
5 sites and 4 links, of which 4 are recorded as not protected. Figures are from the public sources listed on the page.
Who operates SEA-ME-WE 6 Submarine Cable System?
SEA-ME-WE 6 Consortium