CanaLink – Canarias Submarine Link
Canalink, one of the companies within the ITER group, owns a system of undersea fibre-optic cables which link the Canary Islands with the Iberian Peninsula and the western coast of Africa. It also has exchange agreements with other operators, and participates in undersea cable consortia aiming to connect Europe with Africa and turn Tenerife, and the D-Alix datacentre specifically, into a node of massive exchange of neutral data traffic.
Undersea network
The undersea network comprises links between Tenerife and Cádiz, Tenerife and La Palma, and Tenerife and Gran Canaria. These connections enable Canalink to sell both data capacity and point-to-point circuits linking each of the main islands of the Canaries archipelago and in the Iberian Peninsula.
In turn, the connection with the Iberian Peninsula has a branch that connects Cadiz with Morocco, and is used exclusively by the largest Moroccan service provider.
All cables are equipped with the latest technology, carrying lambdas or channels of up to 100Gb, enabling Canalink to use to maximum effect the available bandwidth.
In addition, Canalink plays an active part in the WACS (West Africa Cable System) and ACE (Africa Coast to Europe) undersea cable consortia, thereby linking most countries along the western African coast, as well as Paris and Lisbon.
Technical centres and undersea cable stations
Canalink operates in the Canary Islands through its technical centres and undersea cable stations, which are designed to accommodate third-party operators in their technical rooms.
All systems and facilities have redundancy back-up. Stand-alone generators, rectifiers with doubled-up battery banks UPS (A + B), precision acclimatisation systems and remote monitoring and management systems ensure that the Canalink centres are perfectly equipped to host the equipment of other operators.
Two further major cable stations are located on the Spanish mainland, equipped to the same standard as its Canary Island counterparts. Through the local terrestrial network, they serve some of the most important centres in Seville, including the Telvent datacentre there. In addition, upon request at present, services could also be provided in Madrid.
At an international level, Canalink’s most important market presence is the Telvent datacentre in Lisbon, which is connected via the WACS and ACE undersea cables.
