Lumos project will connect its network to undersea cables

Published March 7, 2018 by Robert Powell, III

Waynesboro-based Lumos Networks Corp. is working on a project that will enable it to route bandwidth traffic from two undersea cables to data centers in Ashburn.

Lumos plans to connect its fiber network to a building at 1632 Corporate Landing Parkway in Virginia Beach, which is being converted into a
co-location facility operated by Globalinx Data Centers.

The Globalinx facility is a short distance from the Cable Landing Station, where undersea cables will connect Virginia Beach with Spain and Brazil later this year.

Once Lumos network is connected to the Globalinx building later this year, it also will be linked to the Cable Landing Station.

With that development, “we will have the ability to route bandwidth traffic from the Cable Landing Station all the way to numerous data centers in Ashburn,” Timothy G. Biltz, Lumos’ CEO, said in statement. “It is estimated that 70 percent of total global Internet traffic passes through the Ashburn area.”

Greg Twitt, the founder and president of Globalinx, said in a statement that “Virginia Beach is becoming the new Continental Edge where the subsea
networks from around the world can handoff the international traffic directly and seamlessly to terrestrial networks at a Globalinx colocation facility.”

The two undersea cables are MAREA, jointly owned by Telefonica (Telxius), Microsoft and Facebook, and BRUSA, which is totally owned by Telefonica.

MAREA, which will connect the Cable Landing Station with Spain, is expected to become operational in the first quarter of this year.

BRUSA, which will connect the station with Brazil, is expected to begin operating during the second half of 2018.

Lumos serves 27 markets in Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio and Kentucky. It has a fibert network of 11,028 route miles.

Globalinx is developing a colocation campus in Virginia Beach to facilitate direct connectivity between undersea cables and land-based fiber networks. The three-phase project includes 150,000 square feet of data-center space on a 11.5-acre site.