LS HongQi Cable & System, the local manufacturing unit of LS C&S in China, announced that it has won a Kuwait cable deal worth approximately $53 million. Per reports in The Pulse and The Korea Herald, the deal signed with the Ministry of Electricity and Water in Kuwait calls for LS HongQi to provide extra-high voltage underground cables. They noted that this represents the first such order that the company has secured from the Middle East. LS C&S acquired a 91.5% stake in LS HongQi in 2009. The new contract for LS HongQi amounts to more than half of all the company’s last annual revenues. The company, at that point, had mainly covered local cable demand. "LS HongQi C&S has strived to clinch deals in the overseas markets," said Myung Roh-hyun, CEO of LS C&S Asia. "The company expects to log additional deals in the overseas markets." In other news, LS C&S reported that it has won an order for aerial cables worth $60 million from Bangladesh. A press release said that the cables are to be provided on a turnkey basis in which it will be is responsible from cable production to pylon construction. The project is to start this year and be completed by June 2020. "The new project would serve as an opportunity for us to aggressively participate in aerial cable projects overseas," said Myung Roh-hyun, chief executive of LS C&S. The company has so far clinched orders worth more than $100 million, including a $46 million contract in Bangladesh it signed last September to add more underground cables in urban areas.

China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and state-owned China Telecom are among those taking part in discussions about building a 10,500 km fiber-optic link across the Arctic Circle that would cost an estimated 700 million euros. A report in the South China Morning Post said that China is in discussions with Finland, Japan, Russia and Norway "to create the fastest data connection between Europe and China as soon as 2020." The story said that the faster connectivity with help European financial centers and data hubs, and fits into China’s long-term "Belt and Road" trade-and-infrastructure initiative. The project, made logistically feasible by melting in the Arctic region, furthers China’s growing ties with Finland, the story said. It noted that Xi Jinping is the first Chinese president to visit the country since 1995. A freight railway between the Finnish city of Kouvola and China’s Xian recently opened and Finnair is seeking to become a regional hub for flights between the two continents. Cinia Group, a Finnish government-owned information and communications technology company, has a prominent role in the so-called "Northeast Passage" cable project and is looking for partners. "It has been widely expressed that this cable route would provide a game changer in the industry," said Jukka-Pekka Joensuu, an executive adviser to Cinia. Estimates suggest that the new cable could cut the time delay from Asia to Europe in half.