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I agree. UCLA is building 1 dorm building right now and it's estimated to cost $1.5 billion. Being a Californian real estate project it will no doubt have cost
by missedthecue 4y ago
I agree. UCLA is building 1 dorm building right now and it's estimated to cost $1.5 billion. Being a Californian real estate project it will no doubt have cost overruns.
- paxys 4y agoThis cable would undoubtedly have cost many times that amount had it run along the west coast of the USA rather than Africa. People always forget about currency conversion and purchasing power when having such discussions.
- systemvoltage 4y agoNo, it would cost more if it’s not in USD. XXXUSD rates have gone up by 20% for a lot of currencies this year.
- paxys 4y agoUnless you are paying the workers in USD that has no effect on the final price.
- systemvoltage 4y agoI was referring to the cost of the materials. If we are talking about labor, sure. Most of the cost I presume isn’t labor though. Materials are imported with a weakened currency.
- paxys 4y agoGoogle's cash reserves are in USD. Either they are purchasing the materials in USD (so no difference to them), or in the local currency (which works out better when USD is strong). So either way a strong dollar is good for them.
- fomine3 4y agoGoogle will receive less AD revenue in USD if ad market is primary competing by local ad clients.
- throwaway2037 4y agoYou wrote: <<Google's cash reserves are in USD.>> I tried to search for confirmation of this fact. I cannot find anything. Do you have a source? And, can anyone confirm if you can pay for Google services using non-USD? I assume yes. I cannot believe that Google is selling adverts in Japan, Korea, and Taiwan and not accepting local currency. Also, Google has many, many employees overseas (ex-US), so they need lots of non-USD to pay local employees and expenses (office space, etc.).
- akmarinov 4y agoTo add to this, people would also likely forget that the US west coast is about 1/3 that of Africa’s, so it’ll get you only about as far as Nigeria. Africa is massive!
- bawolff 4y agoAre you using local talent to lay the cable? I would generally assume you use the same crew and same boats all the way through, who probably dont want to be paid in local currency.
- merely-unlikely 4y agoProbably not local talent/currency along the whole route. But if we are comparing to a project off the West Coast of the US where (I think) they'd be required to use a US flagged vessel and American crew, then it still should be far cheaper. And that's before environmental reviews, etc.
- zbrozek 4y agoIt would also not begin construction until 2044 when all the CEQA lawsuits are complete.
- est31 4y agoThere is a cable project currently ongoing for the east coast of the USA, called Confluence-1, to be finished in 2023. I wonder what their budget for that cable is. https://confluencenetworks.net/ https://confluencenetworks.net/
- bombcar 4y agoIf it is Atlassian Confluence-1 it will be way over budget and slow to boot.
- giantrobot 4y agoAn astounding 400Kbps supporting 3 concurrent users!
- cpursley 4y agoYou just won an internet, congratulations.
- Rebelgecko 4y agoFWIW the SEA-US cable occupies some prime beach town real estate in California and Hawaii and still only cost like $250m. I was looking at the cables that go along the west coast and the ones I checked were even cheaper than that, although they're old enough that inflation could be more of a factor
- Symbiote 4y agoI doubt it would be much different. This cable was (at least in parts, e.g. past Togo) laid by cable layer ship Teliri, registered in Italy. The company's map shows they've laid several cables in/to North America: http://www.elettratlc.it/works.php http://www.elettratlc.it/works.php
- tibbydudeza 4y agoIs that the one with no windows funded by a billionare ????.
- benburleson 4y agoNo, that's the Munger project at UCSB.
- aidenn0 4y agoWhich is estimated a $1.2B, fwiw.
- bogomipz 4y agoNo, that is in Santa Barbara. Same university system though, just two hours north.