The cable called SEA-ME-WE 4 (South East Asia, Middle East and Western Europe) is the fourth cable of a series of cables connecting the continents over almost 20,000km. The cable has the design capacity of 1.28 tera bits per second (tbps).

The announcement was made at the Grand Hyatt in Dubai in presence of the 16 consortium partners involved in the project as well as government, business and media representatives.

The 16 companies forming the consortium are Algeria Telecom, Bharti (India), BTTB (Bangladesh), Cat Telecom (Thailand), Etisalat (UAE), France Telecom, MCI (a telecommunication giant), PTCL (Pakistan), Singapore Telecom, Sri Lanka Telecom, Saudi Telecom, Telecom Egypt, Telecom Italia Sparkle, Telecom Malaysia, Tunisie Telecom and VSNL (India).

BTTB Chairman Abdul Maleque Akhand representing Bangladesh termed the submarine cable 'a symbol of international cooperation'.

"This cable will enable Bangladesh join the information super highway, bring international telecom services within reach of common people and open up opportunities for rapid growth of information & communication technology (ICT) in the country," he added.