ANALYTICS
BY MICHAEL THORNTON
T
his year has been challenging for many industries around the world due to the continued COVID-19 pandemic. As important as offshore energy is to the global economy, the energy industry has not been immune its impact. Compared to previous years, demand for hydrocarbons has been reduced, while production capability has been met with difficulties imposed by quarantines and social distancing requirements. As a result, submarine fiber activity in this market has been brought almost to a standstill. However, while the immediate impacts are disheartening, the long-term effects of the global pandemic could result in a boon for the submarine fiber industry. COVID-19 has forced many industries to expand their remote work and automation capabilities – all of which need the capacity and reliability that only fiber can provide. As the demand for more capacity to offshore facilities grows, so will the demand for submarine fiber systems as the more traditional satellite and O3b telecoms solutions are simply unable to meet the data demands.
BY THE NUMBERS
Before 2019, there were several new systems added around the world, as various offshore energy companies began to realize the benefits of fiber systems for their offshore facilities. However, a dip in oil prices in late 2018 through early 2019 and an overall global economic downturn slowed, or flat out halted, progress on systems
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SUBMARINE TELECOMS MAGAZINE
for 2019. As prices and the economy began to pick back up through the latter half of the year, several systems were announced for 2020 and beyond – making it seem like things were back on track. Of course, COVID-19 hit the world towards the end of Q1 2020 and brought the entire world to a standstill, with quarantine procedures effectively keeping people at home. With less commuting and travel, demand for oil and gas was brought down significantly in 2020. Due to these circumstances, 4 systems that had been planned for 2020 did not enter service on time. However, as the industry focuses on utilizing new technologies to increase efficiency and automation
as a key strategy to reduce cost and maintain margins – especially considering the new reality brought on by pandemic quarantine and social distancing procedures – demand for new offshore fiber systems should increase through 2024. Granted, due to the ongoing global impact of COVID-19, it has become apparent that our initial estimates for length of cable added in 2023 has drastically changed. Substantial delays and cancellations have greatly altered the landscape of our data. The growth we were expecting to see in 2023 has shifted to the following year in 2024, however the amount of growth is much lower. As a result, 2023 is now expected to see very little length added.