The Impact of Submarine Cables on Internet Access Price, and the Role of Competition and Regulation
June 20, 2025
Joël Cariolle, Research Fellow at FERDI, took part in the session on Game theory & Industrial Organization on Tuesday July 1. On this occasion, he presented his study “The Impact of Submarine Cables on Internet Access Price, and the Role of Competition and Regulatio” co-authored with Georges Vivien Houngbonon, Tarna Silue and Davide Strusani.
This paper examines the impact of submarine internet cables on the price of internet access. Using a dataset of submarine cable capacity and Internet access prices in 150 countries over a 12-year period, the authors show that a doubling of submarine cable capacity reduces Internet prices by 30-50%, with regional disparities.
