Fiber Optics Will Span the Country

THE Costa Rican Electricity and Telecom Institute (ICE) has contracted Swedish firm Ericsson to install 1,092 kilometers of fiber-optic cables across the country, “from border to border and coast to coast.”

The $65 million project seeks to provide high-speed voice and data telecommunications services to the entire country, the daily La República reported.

The project, known as Border to Border, includes the installation of 244 km of fiber optics from Peñas Blancas, near the border with Nicaragua, to the central town of San Ramón.

An additional 326 km of cables will be placed between Tarbaca, on the outskirts of the Central Valley, and Paso Canoas, near the border with Panama. Another 522 km are planned from both the country’s coasts to the eastern and western edges of the Central Valley.

These four cables will interconnect with the Central Valley’s existing fiberoptic network.

The project’s main goal is to provide the country with high-capacity (up to 10 Gigabits per second) transmission infrastructure that can be used simultaneously for local, international and cellular telephone calls, as well as high-speed Internet data-transmission.

ICE officials say the new fiber-optic network will complement the country’s long-awaited and much-delayed Advanced Internet Network (TT, Dec. 19, 2003).

The project is part of Costa Rica’s commitment to the Puebla-Panama Plan, which aims to interconnect the highways, electrical systems and data-transmission infrastructure from Southern Mexico to Panama.