Four British and German telecommunications companies have got together to co-operate on the construction of a new submarine cable between Scarborough in the UK and Grossheide in Germany. Cable & Wireless Communications, British Telecommunications Plc, German telecoms joint venture o.tel.o and Deutsche Telekom AG, together with a number of other unnamed companies, have signed a joint co-owners agreement for the cable, due to come into service with a capacity of 40 Gbit/s by October 1998. Each of the four companies will provide its own separate cable stations. Other carriers will have an opportunity to become co-owners of the cable, called UK-Germany 6, by signing a supplementary agreement in April 1998. The cable is intended to provide extension capacity to North, East and Central Europe and connect with other cable systems landing in the UK.