Columbus Networks Completes New Fiber Optic Cable Station in Boca Raton

Company Nearing Activation of Colombia to Florida Undersea Cable
Express Route
MIAMI--(Business Wire)--
Columbus Networks has completed construction of a cable landing
station in Boca Raton, Fla., marking the last major step before
activating an $80 million express undersea fiber optic route that
connects South America with the United States via Colombia and
Florida.

The state-of-the-art landing station in Boca Raton is one of three
along the 2,400-kilometer undersea fiber optic cable route. The other
two stations are in Morant Point, Jamaica, and Cartagena, Colombia.
Columbus Networks and its affiliate companies now operate 35 landing
stations throughout the Americas and Caribbean regions, offering an
unmatched broadband network of multiple self-healing fiber rings for
ensuring high performance and network reliability.

Columbus Networks will host an official inauguration ceremony and
building tour at 4 p.m. Eastern Time, Thursday, July 31 at the Boca
Raton site to commemorate completion of the landing station. Boca
Raton government officials along with representatives from various
U.S. and regional telecommunications carriers, will join Columbus
Networks executives at the ceremony.

"Boca Raton continues to develop as an international gateway for
telecommunications access between the United States and the Caribbean
and Latin America Region," said Paul Scott, president of Columbus
Networks. From Boca Raton, Columbus Networks is the only network
provider with a direct express route to Colombia.

"Columbus Networks' new landing station in Boca Raton creates
geographical diversity from the current concentration of cable
landings in Miami," Scott said. "This significantly lessens the risk
of service disruptions caused by major weather disasters as it is
unlikely these will simultaneously hit both locations with sufficient
force to impact our hardened facilities."

For network redundancy and route diversity, Columbus Networks also
maintains another major landing station in North Miami Beach, about 40
miles south of Boca Raton. "This is very appealing to other regional
and international telecommunications carriers that require our
services," Scott said.

"The Colombia to Florida express route, dubbed CFX-1, represents
one of the most important recent telecommunications projects for
stimulating economic expansion, broadband growth and improved
infrastructure reliability throughout the Caribbean and Latin America
Region," Scott said.

Once CFX-1 is activated next month, telecommunications traffic can
move from Florida to Colombia and back in about 24 milliseconds,
faster than a blink of an eye. A round-trip transmission from Florida
to Jamaica can be completed within 15 milliseconds.

The new Boca Raton landing station is constructed to withstand
sustained Category 5 hurricane-level storms with winds of more than
160 miles an hour. Exterior walls are constructed with 12-inch
concrete blocks with three-quarter-inch reinforced steel bars in every
cell and filled with high-strength concrete. The building is equipped
with battery backup systems along with dual 500-kilowatts power
generators, high-performance redundant air conditioners, latest fire
prevention, detection and suppression systems, video surveillance and
state of the art security systems.

About Columbus Networks

Columbus Networks is a wholesale communications service provider
that offers advanced, high-speed bandwidth capacity to
telecommunications companies and Internet Service Providers. Columbus
Networks is the 94 percent owner and principal operator of the
Americas Region Caribbean Optical-ring System (ARCOS). With more than
14,000 kilometers of undersea fiber optic cable, including its
affiliate companies, Caribbean Crossing (The Bahamas) and Fibralink
(Jamaica), Columbus Networks is the largest subsea transport company
connecting the United States, Mexico, Central America, South America
and the Caribbean. Columbus Networks is an affiliate of Columbus
Communications, both of which are wholly owned subsidiaries of
Columbus International Inc. The company's website is
www.columbus-networks.com. Telephone: 1-786-274-7400.

Columbus Networks
Martha Salas, 1-786-274-7163 or 1-305-205-1596 (cell)
msalas@columbus-networks.com

Copyright Business Wire 2008