A new high-capacity subsea cable system known as Candle is moving forward across the Asia-Pacific, targeting service activation in 2028 with a design capacity of up to 570 Tbps. The system will span approximately 8,000 km, linking major digital hubs including Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore. The project reflects continued investment in intra-Asia connectivity as demand accelerates for AI workloads, cloud services, and 5G-driven applications across one of the world’s fastest-growing digital regions.
Candle is backed by a consortium that includes Meta, SoftBank Corp., IPS Inc., Telekom Malaysia, and XLSmart Telecom Sejahtera, with Globe Telecom joining in April 2026 as both an investor and landing partner. The Philippines segment will include landing points at Nasugbu in Batangas, with potential expansion to Baler on Luzon’s eastern coast. The system supplier, NEC Corporation, is responsible for end-to-end delivery, including cable manufacturing, repeaters, marine installation, and commissioning.
The architecture calls for 24 fiber pairs using the latest high-count cable design, enabling one of the largest capacities ever deployed on an intra-Asia route. Planned landing sites include Maruyama (Japan), Toucheng (Taiwan), Batam (Indonesia), Sedili (Malaysia), and Changi North (Singapore), forming a dense regional mesh that improves both latency and resiliency. Routing strategies are expected to emphasize shallower and politically stable corridors in parts of Southeast Asia, reflecting increasing sensitivity to permitting, security, and redundancy requirements in subsea infrastructure planning.
- 8,000 km subsea cable spanning Northeast and Southeast Asia
- 24 fiber pairs supporting up to 570 Tbps total system capacity
- Supplier: NEC Corporation (full turnkey system integration)
- Consortium includes Meta, SoftBank, Telekom Malaysia, XLSmart, IPS, and Globe Telecom
- Planned service date: 2028
- Key landing points: Japan, Taiwan, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore
- Philippines landing: Nasugbu (Batangas) with potential Baler expansion
- Focus on AI, cloud, and 5G-driven traffic growth across Asia
“Candle will deliver the next generation of connectivity needed to support rapid digital growth across Asia, enabling higher capacity, improved resiliency, and lower latency for emerging applications.”
🌐 Analysis
Candle aligns with a broader wave of intra-Asia subsea investment led by hyperscalers and regional operators seeking to localize traffic flows and reduce dependence on traditional trans-Pacific routes. Projects such as Bifrost, Apricot, and Echo—also involving Meta and regional partners—demonstrate a shift toward denser, multi-landing regional topologies optimized for AI-era traffic patterns rather than legacy hub-and-spoke architectures.
The use of 24 fiber pairs at 570 Tbps highlights continued scaling in subsea design, enabled by advances in spatial division multiplexing (SDM) and optical transmission technologies. With NEC Corporation leading multiple recent builds, competition among suppliers such as Alcatel Submarine Networks and SubCom continues to center on capacity density, power efficiency, and deployment timelines as Asia becomes the focal point of global subsea expansion.
