The total area of the world is about 3600 million square kilometers of oceans, about 71% of the Earth's surface area. With more than 18,000 kilometers of coastline and 3 million square kilometers of "maritime land" and more than 6,500 large and small islands distributed along the coast, China is one of the world's major maritime powers, with vast marine strategic space and huge strategic resources. Under this blue ocean, the submarine cable system has become an important "link" between regions and countries, supporting the transmission of energy and information.
Submarine optical cables, submarine cables and submarine photoelectric composite cables
Submarine cable products are mainly divided into submarine optical cables, submarine cables and submarine photoelectric composite cables according to their functions. With the continuous development of the digital era and the continuous extension of the 5G industry, in order to meet the growing demand for fast and reliable data, the increasing investment demand caused by the development of the Internet of Things and cloud-based technology, and the demand for high-speed Internet for bandwidth expansion applications, countries have been laying submarine fiber optic cables one after another. In recent years, countries around the world have successively released carbon neutrality strategies, which has made offshore wind power, a clean energy, more and more important, which in turn has brought a large number of submarine cables and submarine photovoltaic composite cables. On the whole, as of the end of November 2023, a number of submarine cable projects have been completed or promoted around the world:
It is estimated that by 2025, the scale of China's offshore wind power submarine cable market will reach 25.4 billion yuan
According to Telegeography data, by the end of 2022, 469 submarine cables had been put into operation worldwide, with a total length of more than 1.39 million kilometers. According to the announced plan, from 2023 to 2026, 80 submarine cables with a total length of about 390,000 kilometers will be put into operation. From a global perspective, it has become a global consensus to vigorously develop the digital economy, promote the digital transformation of the economy, and accelerate digital development. At present, the global digital economy is booming, the flow of data elements is accelerating, new technologies, new business formats, and new models are emerging one after another, and the demand for data centers is rising due to digital applications. The exponential growth of data traffic has led to the rapid growth of international bandwidth. From a domestic point of view, first, the construction of offshore wind power projects is hot, bringing a large demand for submarine cables. China's "14th Five-Year Plan for Renewable Energy Development" proposes to optimize the layout of offshore wind power, carry out deep-sea offshore wind power planning, promote large-scale offshore development and deep-sea demonstration development, and focus on the construction of five offshore wind power base clusters in Shandong Peninsula, Yangtze River Delta, southern Fujian, eastern Guangdong and Beibu Gulf. During the 14th Five-Year Plan period, the scale of offshore wind power development plans issued by various regions has reached 80 million kilowatts, and the cumulative installed capacity will exceed 200 million kilowatts by 2030, which will promote the rapid development of offshore wind power. The rapid development of the offshore wind power industry is inseparable from the support of submarine cables. Submarine cables are an important part of the development of offshore wind power projects, accounting for about 8% of offshore wind power investment. Huajing Industry Research Institute predicts that by 2025, China's offshore wind power submarine cable market will reach 25.4 billion yuan. Second, the domestic 5G construction tends to be stable, and there is no obvious "explosion point" in the demand for onshore cables, and the layout of submarine cables or offshore projects has become the business and profit growth point of some manufacturers. Of course, the research and development of high-precision special products still has a strong challenge for China's optical cable industry. For example, the g. for the seabed654.D optical fiber, China has not yet reached the foreign advanced level, the market competitiveness is weak, so this kind of ultra-low loss products have become a typical "neck" technology, which needs to be solved by concerted efforts in the industry. In general, the submarine cable market has a broad space for development, and it is also constantly releasing various needs. For domestic manufacturers with ability and goals, the layout of the submarine cable market has considerable feasibility and considerable profits, and it is one of the roads worth developing at the moment when the growth rate of the domestic cable market is slowing down. Note: Part of the content is quoted from the Research Report on the Development of the Global Optical Cable Industry (2023) by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology