InterGlobix Magazine Founder and Editor-in-Chief, Jasmine Bedi, sat down in conversation with Emanuel Bueso to discuss Trans Americas Fiber System’s financial structuring and project financing. From capital strategy and financial discipline to measuring economic and social impact and paving the way for future investment and growth, he shares his thoughts on balancing potential tradeoffs with risks, returns, and reinvestments.
TAM-1 is fully funded by private investment in a sector traditionally dominated by telecom consortia. What gave investors the confidence to back this project, and how does the private-led model strengthen TAFS’ long-term positioning?
The really important piece here is that by the time we went to market, we had already sourced a substantial number of contracted pre-sales. So, investors weren’t really underwriting a concept or a PowerPoint—they were underwriting the book of business. That commercial foundation paired with the team that we have—people with deep telecom experience and people who have been involved in subsea deployments previously—really gave investors the confidence to invest, especially early on. It wasn’t easy; we had to earn that confidence. There was real skepticism about whether somebody doing this privately could do better than the consortia had done previously. Overcoming that skepticism really required us to be overly rigorous and have all our t’s crossed and i’s dotted when it came to raising capital.
With respect to TAFS’ long-term positioning, being private really gives us speed and flexibility to meet customers where they are today. The world is rapidly changing with AI, and being flexible and fast is a way to capture asymmetric returns today.
