Hawaiki Cable, the New Zealand registered company planning to build a 14,000 km cable system between New Zealand, Australia, Hawaii and the US west coast, has signed up another customer.

Auckland-based trans-Tasman WAN provider Solarix Networks Limited has agreed to buy capacity on the New Zealand, Australia and US segments of Hawaiki’s cable.

Solarix director Flemming H. Rasmussen said the 10-year, multi-million dollar deal with Hawaiki would improve Solarix’s trans-Tasman service resiliency and introduce price competition.

“We treat Australia and New Zealand as a single market. Currently we use three carriers for our trans-Tasman workflow – and all three carriers touch the Southern Cross Cable. Our partnership with Hawaiki will strengthen our market position.”

Rémi Galasso, Chief Executive Officer of Hawaiki Cable Limited, said: “We have received fantastic support for this project since the moment it was announced last year. The deal with Solarix Networks takes us another step closer to cable deployment, and a future-proof cable system that links New Zealand to the rest of the world.”

Last year in September, Hawaiki signed a deal with US-based cable developer TE SubCom, who will design and lay the planned cable.

Hawaiki has secured capacity deals with a number of telecommunications service providers on both sides of the Tasman, including ASX-listed companies TPG Telecom Limited and iiNet, and local New Zealand ISPs.