Google Building 3 New Undersea Cables to Expand Cloud Business

Google's network of undersea cables is growing.

The Web giant on Tuesday announced plans to commission three new subsea cables in 2019 as part of a plan to expand its cloud computing infrastructure. Google is also gearing up to open new Cloud Platform regions in the Netherlands, Montreal, Los Angeles, Finland, and Hong Kong this year.

The new cables include Curie, which will link Chile to Los Angeles; Havfrue, connecting the US to Denmark and Ireland; and the Hong-Kong-Guam (HK-G) cable system, linking up "major subsea communication hubs in Asia," Google's Vice President for 24/7 Operations Ben Treynor Sloss wrote in a blog post. Curie, named after the scientist Marie Curie, will be Google's own private cable, while Havfrue, which is Danish for "mermaid, and HK-G are consortium cables the company is building alongside others.

"Together, these investments further improve our network—the world's largest—which by some accounts delivers 25 percent of worldwide internet traffic," Treynor Sloss wrote.

With Curie, Google is set to become the first major non-telecom company to build a private intercontinental cable. When operational, Curie will serve Google users across Latin America.

"Owning the cable ourselves has some distinct benefits," Treynor Sloss wrote. "Since we control the design and construction process, we can fully define the cable's technical specifications, streamline deployment and deliver service to users and customers faster. Also, once the cable is deployed, we can make routing decisions that optimize for latency and availability."

Meanwhile, Google is building Havfrue with Facebook, Aqua Comms and Bulk Infrastructure, and working with RTI-C and NEC on the HK-G cable system.

"We're excited about these improvements," Treynor Sloss wrote. "We're increasing our commitment to ensure users have the best connections in this increasingly connected world."

This article originally appeared on PCMag.com.