Making ends meet.
Skagenfiber AS went from idea to realization in four years. Remarkable timing, cost-saving planning combined with applaudable engineering made for legendary merits in the industry. The team pioneered jet-trenching in subsea cable laying and the terrestrial cable stretch pushed build quality to unprecedented levels. Now the fibre cable is operational, providing Norway with a fighting chance in the race to harbour industrial data centres.
Established in 2016
The year was 2016, and the cheapest renewable energy in the world could not attract large scale server farms to Norway on its own. A band of visionaries assembled and did something about it.
Skagenfiber AS was founded in 2016 on Helge´s initiative, with co-founders Rune Skow, Ola Toftegaard-Hox, John Amundsen and Jens Gamlem. In 2017, Geir Holmer joined the company as CEO. The partners represented senior industry experience, each with 20 years + practical building competence for building telecom networks, data center constructions and fiber installations. A small team planning a big build, and in November 2020, the new Nordic digital highway was delivered on time and budget.
The critical lack of secure fibre redundancy towards continental Europe disqualified Norway as a destination for many players in the industry. Having experienced several projects arrive at this conclusion, the founders of Skagenfiber set out with their ambitious plan to build a new digital highway. 145 km of terrestrial combined with 170km of submarine fibre optic cable needed to be laid down between Oslo and Hirtshals.
Skagenfiber CEO Geir Holmer, CTO Rune Skow and COO Helge Gallefoss after the cable landing operation in Larvik, Norway.
Because 20% of the world's total electricity consumption may be used by the Internet by 2025, facilitating for data centres where there is renewable power is essential for sustainability. This industry has a perk no other power-consuming industry has, it distributes the product with photons, and it is nearly lossless. That is why the sector should be prioritized for green energy. With the stable operational properties of hydropower, Norway is especially suited for this. Utilizing the electricity close to where it is generated eliminates the significant transition loss in the electric grid. To meet Europe’s future demand for computing, it makes more sense to send photons over nearly lossless fibre cables, rather than electrons over long distances with 20%+ loss of energy.
Building a brilliant team for the project execution.
Successfully negotiating large contracts on fair terms and building a team of driven and talented contractors was pivotal to the project and something we take great pride in.
Rigorous planning for cable economy, working closely with contractors.
One cable stretching more than 170km without a single splice. With elaborate seabed studies, the team managed to route an incredibly accurate plan and find clever new ways of handling the cable. Skagenfiber CTO Rune Skow boards the cable-laying vessel, being hands-on in every decision on the 21-day voyage. The cable was buried 1-2m below sea bottom all the route. As COO Helge Gallefoss took charge of the cable landing, designed and project managed the landing stations.
Efficiently preparing for the voyage across Skagerak.
The Polar King is refitted for the subsea construction job in Eydehavn, Norway. The custom cable drum is one of many cleverly engineered solutions provided by subsea contractor Cecon, holding the whole 170+ km of Nexans reinforced fibre optic cable. Perfectly calculated, the drum is lifted on board as one single unit, saving days of crewed docking time, which it normally takes to spool a cable of this dimension onboard.
Terrestrial construction begins, with David overseeing every step of the way.
In March 2020 plans go to action. Being involved with Skagenfiber on the sideline since its conception, even designing the company logo, David Gallefoss joins to coordinate planning, documentation, permits and QC between entities involved in the project.
Contractors Herolf Hansen & Sønn AS and Netel AS embark on the terrestrial cable construction alongside E18, working night shifts to avoid traffic. David joins every single night shift to document close to a total of 500 manholes, mapping the exact position over a 140km stretch and planning where to splice for optimal cable economy with the in-house developed digital system.
Built on time and budget. by being hands-on every day, ad-hoc engineering solutions.
Working alongside nature on a big infrastructure project is unpredictable and full of surprises. Decisions have to be made ad-hoc to maintain progress and secure budgets.
The 2020 COVID situation was challenging, travel and deliveries were restricted, but we managed to build on time and budget.
Creative solutions based on deep technical skills have to be found and implemented to secure the install and keep control over expenses. A team of approximately 120 persons were involved, and the running cost of the install ship was almost 100K EUR per day. Un necessary delays had to be avoided.
Key success factors
Meticulous detailed planning, contingency planning, sourcing the right team with the right attitude and clear responsibilities were key factors for performance. A very important factor was to engage and inspire all members of the larger team to feel ownership and pride for the project, giving their best and feel the responsibility for success.
In the real world, no planning can cover all potential “Murphy” issues, thereby being on site, day to day , to detect issues and find responsible solutions on the fly was very important. Hand-on, and GSD (get shit done), was another important success factor.
We are proud to have Altibox Carrier take over Skagenfiber and facilitate the next wave of industrial server farms in a country running on reliable hydropower.
