EXPANDING GLOBALLY SUBOPTIC SYMPOSIA BY DR. Y. NIIRO
I
posium was organized to revitalize Japanese submarine cable industry. The first symposium 2019 was attended by 100 people, the second by 300, and the third by 250. As described in the Figure 2, Japan symposium is held once a year at a venue of university to listen to Figure 1: The Okinawa Maru, Japan’s first cable ship lectures by industry experts on the latest submarine cable technologies, the latest market trends, cable installation, cable maintenance, etc. The JAPAN SYMPOSIUM symposia were attended by telecommunication companies, The first submarine cable in Japan began 150 years ago, equipment manufacturers, cable manufacturers, and cable when a 1 km long, single-core telegraph submarine camaintenance specialists and others involved in the submable was laid between Honshu and Kyushu. In 1896, the rine cable industry. Okinawa Maru, a full-scale cable ship of 2,200 tons built in England, was put into service (Figure 1). Over the years, teleSUBOPTIC graph submarine cable technolThe first international Subogy was inherited, and Japan Optic conference was held in later developed its own coaxial Versailles, France in 1986. After submarine cable systems, which that, the conference was very were laid in the Pacific Ocean active due to the global expanand Asian area. sion of optical submarine cables, Thirty years ago, recurring and the number of participants meetings of local submarine increased year by year. As Subcable experts began, led by those Optic grew, its sponsorship by who had developed and laid cothe system suppliers evolved, and axial submarine cables, with the SubOptic reinvented itself with a aim of passing on the valuable new constitution as the SubOptic experience of submarine cables. Association in 2017. The focus of This meeting was held once a the Association continued to be year for more than ten years, but the tri-annual conference which gradually declined due to the Suboptic was renowned for. Later, aging of the members. just a year or so ago, the AssoFour years ago, concerned ciation launched the SubOptic about the decline of the submaFoundation to expand its value to rine cable industry in Japan, the the industry.SubOptic set up the Figure 2: Japan Symposium 2019 Optical Submarine Cable SymFoundation to focus on outreach n the year 2022, a symposium on optical submarine cable systems that started in Japan has expanded rapidly to world-wide. This article will describe: Why did the symposium start from Japan? Why did it expand to the world so quickly? And what will happen in the future?
JANUARY 2023 | ISSUE 128
37