Asia into South America, Through Fortaleza

The two ways in, and why it matters

• Via North America. The common path: Pacific to the United States, then south. It concentrates in Miami and lands in Brazil at Fortaleza, and it is the route most Asian carriers already have partial capacity on.
• Via Europe. Asia to Europe, then the direct Atlantic crossing from Lisbon or Madrid to Fortaleza and São Paulo. Longer on the map, sometimes better in practice, and always useful as the diverse path when the other one is the primary.

The point is not that one is right. It is that most projects never compare them, because each supplier quotes only the leg it owns.

What Asian networks usually underestimate in Brazil

• The contract, not the capacity. Brazilian carriers require a local entity. The subsea capacity is the easy purchase; the domestic circuit is where the project stops.
• Distance from the site. Brazil is continental. A circuit into a plant in the interior is not the same purchase as a port in São Paulo, and coverage maps do not tell you the difference.
• Timezone and language. Support that answers in Portuguese, in Brazilian business hours, is either arranged in advance or discovered during the first outage.

What we do

We are a neutral multicarrier operator in Brazil, present at IX.br Rio through AS269311 in the Globenet cable landing station, and at 60 Hudson and Equinix Miami through AS14840. We do not sell you the subsea leg. We deliver and support the Brazilian side, under one contract and one SLA, including before your local entity exists.

Send the Brazilian endpoints and the capacity. Price, lead time and SLA come back normally within two business hours.

Questions we get asked

Is there a direct submarine cable between Asia and Brazil?

No. Traffic from Asia reaches South America either across the Pacific and through North America, or across to Europe and then over the direct Atlantic crossing. Both paths land in Brazil at Fortaleza.

Why does everything land at Fortaleza?

Because Fortaleza is where most of the subsea systems serving Brazil land, which makes it the practical entry point for South America, and is why capacity into Brazil is discussed in terms of Fortaleza even when the customer site is thousands of kilometres away.

Should Asian traffic reach Brazil through the United States or through Europe?

It depends on where the traffic originates and what it is for, and the honest answer is that most projects never compare the two, because each supplier quotes only the leg it owns. The European crossing is also the natural diverse path when the American one is primary.

Can an Asian carrier or enterprise contract Brazilian circuits without a local entity?

Yes. That is normally the blocking step, not the capacity. We contract the Brazilian side on your behalf so ordering and delivery start before your entity exists.

Who answers when a circuit fails in Brazil?

We do, as the local counterpart, in Brazilian business hours and in Portuguese with the underlying carrier. A contract signed abroad does not put anyone at the site.

Related: buying Brazil capacity from Miami · the direct Europe route · IP transit in Brazil · for carriers and ISPs