Emerald Networks Chooses Killala Bay In County Mayo As Landing Location For Their New-Build Fiber Optic Cable System Known As "Emerald Express"

DUBLIN and MAYO, Ireland, Jan. 13, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Emerald Networks Holdings Limited ("Emerald Networks"), a new-build submarine cable system provider connecting North America to Europe and Iceland with extraordinary new capacity, today announced Killala Bay in County Mayo as its landing site.

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Emerald Networks has been working with Mayo County Council and Government agencies over the past three years researching a variety of potential Submarine Cable landing locations on the Mayo coastline. 

Considerations had been given to a number of different sites with the primary objective of establishing a long-term, unobtrusive landing solution that would have minimal impact on the environment while meeting the international projects connectivity requirements.

The decision to make a landfall in Killala Bay came as a result of a thorough analysis of all aspects of the project and the potential it represents to the local economy, including:

• Minimizing any disturbance to the local environment
• Eliminating any impact on local fishing
• Ensuring the security of the cable and landing station
• Maximizing the ease of interconnecting to terrestrial infrastructure for carrying international traffic to Dublin and on to London and the European mainland.

In addition to these factors, the project will be contributing to a confluence of interest in the Killala region due to the planned renewable energy power plant, which in turn makes it a very attractive location for the booming data centre industry, which has as its two biggest requisites an abundance of international connectivity and a large power source.

All these factors contribute to making Killala Bay an ideal landing location for Emerald Networks and one that will lead to the creation of a wide variety of new business opportunities for the local region.

The project will put Ireland in a very strategic position in the International data processing and transmission network and has been developed with the full support of the Taoiseach and Government and particularly the Department of Energy Communications and Natural Resources.

Welcoming the announcement Mayo County Manager Mr. Peter Hynes said, "This is very good news for Mayo, the entire West region and indeed the country. It will bring significant further opportunities in the Communications and Data Processing areas in the future."

CEO of Mayo County Enterprise Board and Head of Mayo County Council's Enterprise and Investment Unit Ms. Joanne Grehan confirmed that "We have been working with Emerald Networks, State Agencies and Government Departments on this project since 2011. We look forward to the cable coming ashore and we will continue to work to attract investment and jobs to what will be a most attractive location for a range of data related Enterprises."

Emerald Networks CEO Bill Marra said, "We very much appreciate the continuing help and support that we have received over the course of developing this project from the Irish Government, its agencies and especially the local authorities in Mayo. We believe that this project will make the region significantly more attractive to the major companies in the data centre industry."

About Emerald Networks

Emerald Networks, is a new-build network submarine cable system that will connect North America to Europe and Iceland with extraordinary new capacity and will be a low-latency network across the Atlantic. Emerald Networks is an open network architecture platform that is agnostic and enables upgrades with various new technologies. It will be the first coherent designed system initially running 100 G wavelengths with a unique route that links Shirley, New York to the West Coast of Ireland with a branch connection to Grindavik, Iceland and a future branch connection to Southern Europe. The system is scheduled to be ready for service by 4Q 2014

Emerald Networks Contact:  Ms. Lisa Cruise
lcruise@emeraldnetworks.com
+1-678-773-1999

Mayo Contact: Ms. Joanne Grehan
jgrehan@mayococo.ie
+353-086-8565802