Internet in Vietnam set to drag after major cable encounters more problems

Internet users in Vietnam may once again be subjected to a slow service following reports that a major submarine cable ruptured on Tuesday morning, an internet supplier told local media on Wednesday.

Local suppliers switched to other cables as soon as they learned of the news to ensure a smooth service for users, according to Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications Group (VNPT).

The location of the broken section and a timeline for repair work have not been revealed, according to local media reports.

The Asia Pacific Gateway (APG) was launched in January last year and has broken down on at least two occasions.

The cable took four years to build, and runs 10,400 kilometers (6,460 miles) linking Japan with Hong Kong, mainland China, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam.

The project cost $450 million and has a design capacity of more than 54 Tbps, promising to double internet speeds in Vietnam and ease the reliance on the notorious Asia America Gateway (AAG), which has ruptured or been shut down for maintenance on numerous occasions since 2011.

The 20,000-kilometer AAG encountered problems at least five times in 2017.

Vietnam currently has six submarine cable systems, plus a 120 gigabit channel that runs overland through China.

More than 50 million people in Vietnam, or over half of the country’s population, are online.

With a download speed of 5.46 megabytes per second, Vietnam’s internet speed was ranked 74th out of 189 countries and territories in a global survey of broadband speeds compiled by cable.co.uk, a U.K. broadband, TV, phone and mobile provider, last August.

Vietnam’s average broadband speed was 10 times lower than its Southeast Asian neighbor Singapore, according to the survey.