The Undersea Link Asia Needs for Its AI Future

A new subsea route linking Asia’s data hubs signals a scramble to prepare networks for soaring AI traffic

12 Nov 2025

Asia’s telecom groups are preparing a new subsea cable to support fast-growing volumes of artificial intelligence data moving between the region’s cloud centres. The Asia United Gateway East, led by Singtel with NEC as supplier, is planned as an 8,900km system connecting Singapore and Japan with landings in Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, South Korea and Taiwan. It is scheduled to enter service in the third quarter of 2029.

The consortium said the route is designed for workloads generated by machine learning models rather than earlier patterns of consumer web use. It cited projections from research group Omdia suggesting that traffic from AI and AI-enabled applications could exceed traditional internet usage early in the next decade. Analysts have warned that many of Asia’s existing cable systems were built before the current surge in model training, video processing and enterprise computing.

The planned network is intended to add both capacity and resilience. By creating another corridor between Southeast Asia and North Asia, the system would expand bandwidth while offering operators alternative routes when natural disasters or marine incidents disrupt older cables. Earthquakes and heavy shipping activity have made redundancy a priority for governments and service providers across the region.

Operators expect broader economic effects as well. Globe Telecom in the Philippines described the project as a data “superhighway” that could support its cloud ambitions. Policymakers in Indonesia and Malaysia have also linked new subsea links to their efforts to attract large-scale AI investment, arguing that connectivity is becoming as important as tax incentives and land availability.

The project’s long timeline, however, leaves several factors unresolved. Demand will depend on how quickly new data centres obtain power, permits and cross-border network access. Rules on sustainability and data governance may influence how fully the system is used once operational. The long-term value of the cable could also rest on software layers that manage routing and security.

Even so, regional planning has accelerated as governments place AI at the centre of economic policy. Subsea networks, once treated as background utilities, are now viewed as a competitive asset in shaping Asia’s digital landscape.