Alphabet Inc's (NASAQ:GOOG) Google plans to speed up its cloud computing business by expanding its network of undersea cables to new regions across the globe.
In a bid to catch up to rivals Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) and Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) in the multibillion-dollar cloud computing market, Google will build three new underwater fibre-optic cables lining ocean areas from the Pacific to the North Sea.
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The new cables, designed to speed the transfer of data and reroute users to servers around the world if an area crashes or is overloaded, will extend its private data network to regions rivals are yet to reach.
Google expects to complete the project in 2019 and estimates it will cost hundreds of millions of dollars.
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It would bring the number of subsea cables Google has built to 11, adding to its network of fibre optic cables and data centres built up over the past decade.
Google is the third biggest player in cloud computing by revenue behind Amazon and Microsoft.