High-capacity undersea cable systems based on optical transmission over single-mode lightguides offer tremendous economic advantage over coaxial cable technology due to their combined high-bit-rate long repeater spacing potential. However, very stringent requirements for the lightguide transmission medium properties must be met in order to realize the performance goals of such systems. This paper will review the depressed index cladding single-mode fiber design and its resultant performance. The ability to simultaneously realize excellent optical, mechanical, and dimensional properties in lightguides of this type fabricated using the Modified Chemical Vapor Deposition (MCVD) process has resulted in their use in the AT&T SL system to be used in TAT8.