[{"bbox": [96, 155, 1134, 298], "category": "Text", "text": "The Arctic cable project could be an option in the future, connecting EU to Japan via the Arctic. If extended to the Philippines, the Arctic cable would be the country's first direct route to Europe and provide great advantages for example in terms of reduced latency. This remains as one of the options that the Action will explore as a possibly preferred future alternative route to currently existing ones. Other alternatives cables could also be considered."}, {"bbox": [96, 341, 525, 368], "category": "Section-header", "text": "## Regional connectivity issues and limitations"}, {"bbox": [96, 394, 1134, 540], "category": "Text", "text": "Regional connectivity is of paramount importance to ensure that ASEAN neighbourhood countries could access the regional Copernicus data repository (mirror site) located in the Philippines. Assessment of the regional connectivity showed that among all ASEAN countries, Singapore clearly stands out when considering infrastructures. Singapore hosted twenty-six cable systems landing on seven stations, with another dozen of submarine cables anticipated over the next three years. Singapore is a major international hub and transit point."}, {"bbox": [96, 552, 1134, 755], "category": "Text", "text": "Only seventy Internet Exchange Points (IXPs)¹⁵ are reported for the entire ASEAN region. It is relatively few compared to the 535 IXPs censed in the European Union. Moreover, IXPs in ASEAN region are concentrated in a few regional hubs: five national capitals concentrate 70% of the IXPS of the region. The lack of Internet Exchange Points is causing unnecessary routing of regional traffic through international transit, incurring costs as well as increasing latency and reducing speed. Poor routing performance is observed where there is no local or regional facility to exchange Internet traffic. ASEAN countries' internet service providers must pay for international transit facilities to deliver local traffic."}, {"bbox": [96, 772, 1134, 887], "category": "Text", "text": "Data may transit through distant infrastructures, located in the USA, or in the EU, when travelling between two neighbouring countries of the ASEAN, or even within a single country. This results in higher costs and greater latency for internet service providers. This phenomenon is known as tromboning and has proved to be common in the region. Creating Internet Exchange Points (IXPs) and local caching is part of the solution."}, {"bbox": [96, 901, 1134, 1018], "category": "Text", "text": "The broadband penetration rate is particularly low in ASEAN countries. All other countries, including the Philippines, present low performances. In these countries, results observed in urban areas, and particularly the capitals, are comparatively better than on average for the country. The level of digital development varies greatly between ASEAN countries and any regional project needs to take into account this variability."}, {"bbox": [96, 1031, 1134, 1206], "category": "Text", "text": "The Action might therefore have synergies with the EU-ASEAN Sustainable Connectivity Package which could support the creation, upgrade or modernization of telecommunication infrastructures to ensure efficient connectivity at regional level, with a focus on creating open, carrier-neutral and free Open Internet Exchange Points and cache servers to improve regional routing. By locating this infrastructure at strategic crossroads (e.g.in universities), the ASEAN Connectivity package will contribute to providing access to Copernicus data repository to a much wider range of users, *beyond* Education and Research Networks, i.e. public authorities and private entities."}, {"bbox": [96, 1246, 522, 1272], "category": "Section-header", "text": "## National connectivity issues and limitations"}, {"bbox": [96, 1300, 1134, 1475], "category": "Text", "text": "The Philippines counts eight cable systems, six of which are national and three regional (Boracay-Palawan, Palawan-Iloilo, and Sorsogon-Samar). These cable systems are owned and operated by four major telecommunication companies. These operators have deployed their network nation-wide and provide most of the connectivity to almost 300 downstream peers, i.e. small to medium Internet Service Providers. The topology of Internet in the Philippines is still very hierarchical. The Philippines counts nine existing Internet Exchange Points (IXPs) with one additional in project. More than 50% of the IXPs are located in Manila and surroundings, where the population"}, {"bbox": [85, 1572, 1143, 1647], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹⁵ Internet Exchange Point Internet exchange points (IXPs) enable us to connect with each other on the internet. This is a physical location through which Internet infrastructure companies such as Internet Service Providers (ISPs), CDNs, web enterprises, communication service providers, cloud connect to exchange Internet traffic."}, {"bbox": [1038, 1682, 1144, 1707], "category": "Page-footer", "text": "Page 8 of 35"}]