LEGAL & REGULATORY MATTERS RETHINKING SUBMARINE CABLE REPAIR PRIORITIES by Andrés Fígoli DESPITE SUBMARINE CABLE SYSTEMS BEING THE BACKBONE OF GLOBAL CONNECTIVITY, THEIR REPAIR AND MAINTENANCE REGIMES REMAIN ONE OF THE LEAST VISIBLE—AND MOST STRAINED—ELEMENTS OF THE DIGITAL ECOSYSTEM. While the industry has historically managed cable repairs through market-based mechanisms and cooperative maintenance agreements, recent trends raise important questions about whether current models remain fit for purpose. Increasing cable density, regional imbalances in repair capacity, aging fleets, climate risks, few cable depots, and geopolitical constraints are converging to test the resilience of the global repair system. This article explores a critical question that is gaining urgency: how should priorities be determined when multiple submarine cables are damaged simultaneously, and existing repair capacity is insufficient to respond quickly to all faults? Addressing this question requires a careful balance between regulatory intervention and market efficiency, informed by practical experience from industry, governments and international cooperation frameworks.
THE CURRENT MODEL: FIRST COME, FIRST SERVED
cur sporadically and that repair capacity is generally sufficient. That assumption is increasingly challenged. In certain regions, cable cuts are becoming more frequent and clusters of faults in the same geographic area are no longer exceptional. Events linked to fishing activity, anchoring incidents as in the Red Sea and seabed landslides like those that occurred in West Africa in March 2023 can combine to generate multiple faults within short timeframes, overwhelming local repair capacity. In such scenarios, the question is no longer whether a vessel can be dispatched, but which cable should be repaired first—and who decides. In practice, cable owners with greater financial leverage may favour a second model based on private agreements, allowing them to negotiate tailored conditions for their cable systems, including faster response times. Both models—consortium-based maintenance agreements and private arrangements—currently account for a broadly similar share of global submarine cable kilometres under coverage1.
WHEN MULTIPLE CABLES ARE CUT: A GOVERNANCE GAP From time to time, reality delivers a stress test: several cables are cut in the same area, often affecting multiple operators, countries, or even entire regions. When this happens, the limitations of a purely sequential repair model become visible.
Today, it is well known that submarine cable repairs largely operate on a “first “Submarine cable repair is becoming a One possible response come, first served” basis. is regulatory intervenWhen a fault occurs, the governance challenge, as simultaneous tion. Governments could cable owner activates faults, limited vessel capacity, and georequire maintenance the relevant consortium political constraints expose the limits agreement operators to zone agreement and a coordinate more closecable repair vessel is of first-come, first-served maintenance ly, or even mandate joint models.” dispatched when availoperational planning able. This approach has across different maintethe advantage of simplicity and neutrality: no cable nance zones. Another, more controversial idea is is deemed more important than another and no authe designation of a competent authority empowthority is required to rank priorities. ered to arbitrate repair priorities when capacity conHowever, this current model assumes that faults oc- straints arise. 1 Constable, M., Burdette, L, Mauldin, A., “The Future of Submarine Cable Maintenance: Trends, Challenges, and Strategies”, SubOptic 2025, Lisbon, Portugal.
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SUBTEL FORUM | Issue 148