Circuit Status Report (2001)

The FCC International Bureau today released its annual year-end circuit status report for U.S. facilities-based international carriers. The year-end 2001 report reflects slow growth in the use of U.S. international-facilities for international calls and private line services from the United States.

The report is based on information provided by U.S. international facility-based carriers and covers U.S. undersea cables, satellites, and terrestrial links. It identifies the activated (in-service) and idle (available but not in-service) circuits for each international point as of December 31, 2001. The report, which is valuable for Commission regulatory purposes as well as for public use, also includes data from 1998 to 2000 for all international points listed by type of transmission facility. Showing slower growth in 2001 than in past years, the reported number of activated 64 Kbps equivalent circuits at year-end 2001 was 2,404,706, which is only a 21% increase from 2000’s revised figure, 1,983,670. By service type, International Message Telephone Service (IMTS) accounted for 16% of the total circuits used; International Private Line Services accounted for 76% of total circuits; and the remaining 8% of total circuits were used for other data and video services (outside of traditional private line services).

By transmission type, undersea cables increased from 67% of activated circuits in 2000 to 71% in 2001; terrestrial links decreased from 28% in 2000 to 25% in 2001; and satellites decreased slightly from 5% in 2000 to 3% in 2001. The top 30 destinations among all international routes account for 96% of the total activated circuits. The percentage of idle circuits as compared to the total circuit capacity (active and idle) increased from 48% in 2000 to 56% in 2001.