Bulk Infrastructure, the Norwegian company building fiber networks and data centers across Europe, is looking for a majority partner to help fund and build Leif Erikson, its transatlantic undersea cable that would connect Canada with Europe directly, bypassing the United States.
The project – named after the famous Norse explorer – was included in the information presented to global investors at the Canadian government’s investment summit in Toronto in September. The connection, which was presented more than five years ago, runs between Bulk's N01 Campus in Kristiansand, Norway, and land at Happy Valley-Goose Bay in Newfoundland and Labrador, before going through Quebec to reach Montreal. The system would provide “direct, secure, high-capacity data transmission for AI, telecom and hyperscale markets,” according to the summit prospectus. The project follows worsening relations between Canada and the U.S., with the Canadian government looking to reduce direct reliance on its immediate neighbor, Bloomberg reports.
“It needs to be a Canadian sovereign cable system,” said Peder Nærbø, Bulk’s founder and executive chair, who has been working on the idea for more than half a decade. Only a handful of submarine cables directly connect Canada with the rest of the world without routing through the U.S., and none belong to a Canada-based entity. Alphabet Inc.’s Google owns the newest submarine fibre-optic cable, called Topaz, connecting Japan and Canada.
“Canada lacks resilience,” Nærbø said. “The game-changer was when the current situation with the U.S. escalated.” In the Middle East, “there’s deliberate sabotage of cables and other types of challenges with shipping, anchoring and so on.” The current geopolitical tensions make Leif Erikson more appealing. The project is expected to cost more than €550 million, with vendors signed on but studies and financing still required.
