Internet users to see speed boost as new cable lands in Pakistan

The Ministry of Information Technology announced on Saturday that Pakistan’s internet infrastructure is set for a major upgrade with the activation of the South-East Asia–Middle East–Western Europe 6 (SEA-ME-WE 6) submarine cable.

Pakistan has strengthened its global digital connectivity through the SEA-ME-WE 6 system — a 19,200-kilometre high-capacity fibre-optic cable connecting the country to destinations from Singapore to France, according to the ministry.

The system offers an overall capacity exceeding 100 terabits per second and provides what it described as one of the lowest-latency routes between Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Western Europe.

Africa1 اور 2Africa کے بعدپاکستان کی پچھلے ایک سال میں تیسری (اور کل نویں)سب مرین کیبل SeMeWe6 آج دوپہر 12 بجے پاکستانی ساحل تک پہنچ گئی

یہ کیبل 21,000km ہے،فرانس سےسنگاپور تک جاتی ہے اور پاکستان کی موجودہ کھپت میں40٪اضافی صلاحیت شامل کرے گی#transworld #DigitalNationPakistan pic.twitter.com/2RDimkuLkE

— Shaza Fatima Khawaja (@ShazaFK) November 22, 2025

Pakistan’s share of the system amounts to 13.2 terabits per second, the statement said, adding that 4tbps has already been activated. This, the ministry noted, will increase the country’s international bandwidth and strengthen services including cloud platforms, data centres, fintech, e-commerce, streaming and other digital-economy applications.

The ministry said SEA-ME-WE 6 comes with more fibre pairs and more than double the capacity of older SEA-ME-WE cables, adding to the resilience and diversification of Asia-Europe traffic through geo-diverse crossings in Egypt and multiple landing stations.

The system, it added, allows for rapid expansion, improved fault protection and reduced network ownership costs for operators, while also creating an additional redundancy layer for the global internet backbone.

The consortium behind the project includes Transworld Associates from Pakistan, Bangladesh Submarine Cable Company, Bharti Airtel, Dhiraagu, Djibouti Telecom, Mobily, Orange, Singtel, Sri Lanka Telecom, Telecom Egypt, Telekom Malaysia and Telin.