SINGAPORE, Dec. 20(Xinhuanet)-- Singapore Telecommunications(SingTel) announced Tuesday the launch of a new fiber-optic submarine cable, SEA-ME-WE 4, which spans some 20,000 kilometers from Singapore to France through South East Asia, Middle East and Western Europe.

The fourth cable connecting Asia, North Africa and Europe, SEA-ME-WE 4 has a design capacity of 1.28 terabits per second, which is"equivalent to more than one million Internet users simultaneously having real-time access to a 1 Mb(megabits) file,"a SingTel statement said.

The telecommunications operator said that it has invested 40 million US dollars and owns 8 percent of this cable project, which was completed by a consortium of 16 telecommunications companies recently.

SingTel expects the new cable, an additional reliable infrastructure, to enhance its services to customers including Internet Service Providers, carriers and multi-national corporations that wish to expand operations into Asia, Europe and the Middle East.

With the launch of the new cable, SingTel will open two offices in the United Arab Emirates and Bangladesh and offer full suite of services including high-speed Internet access and value-added Internet phone services in Europe from January next year. Enditem