Categories
Posts

The Value Of 5.2 Milliseconds

“Project Express” from Hibernia Networks is a new trans-Atlantic fiber connection from New York to London. It was started in 2011 but isn’t expected to be completed until later in 2014. From a 2012 Bloomberg news article about the project:

Project Express will be the fastest cable across the Atlantic, reducing the time it takes data to travel round-trip between New York and London to 59.6 milliseconds from the current top speed of 64.8 milliseconds

The cost for this new, shorter, fiber line is reportedly over $300M. A big price tag for a 5.2 millisecond reduction in round-trip time.

hibernia-express

It should come as no surprise then that the main customer base for this new connection is high speed trading companies.