Facebook, Telcos Build Subsea Cable to Connect Africa to the World

Facebook and a team of African and global telecommunication majors have struck a deal to build one of the world’s largest subsea cable to connect Africa. This boosts internet availability across three continents, they said in a joint statement held recently.

South Africa’s MTN GlobalConnect and Mauritius-based infrastructure provider WIOCC are partners in this project, alongside the China Mobile International, French telecoms major Orange SA, Saudi Arabia’s STC, Telecom Egypt, and Vodafone.

The project, called 2Africa, aims to build 37,000 kilometers (22990.734 miles) of subsea cable infrastructure which will directly connect countries around the African coast to Europe and the Middle East. This was said by the 2Africa website.

The network will have a design capacity able to carry up to 150 terabytes per second (Tbps) on key parts of the system. The 11 new cables rolled out between 2009 and 2016 in sub-Saharan Africa provided around 70 Tbps of design capacity said 2Africa.

The Subsea Cable to connect Africa infrastructure provider Alcatel Submarine Networks will build the project, which is expected to be operational by 2023/24, the joint statement said. The companies, however, did not reveal how much money they had set aside to invest.

“2Africa… will interconnect Europe, the Middle East, and 21 landings in 16 countries in Africa,” the partners said in the joint statement.

Read on 2Africa here

Subsea cables form the backbone of the internet, carrying 99% of the world’s data traffic.

Africa’s big economies have a large and fast-growing population of internet users, with growth in internet use fuelled by rapidly expanding mobile broadband networks and ever more affordable phones.

However, with a population of 1.3 billion, Africa is still a laggard in internet connectivity, with average internet penetration at around 39% against a world average of 59%.

On completion the subsea network will deliver more than the total combined capacity of all subsea cables serving Africa today, the firms said in the statement.

“Improving connectivity for Africa is a significant step which lays the groundwork for increased digitalization across the continent,” said Vodacom International Business Chief Officer Diego Gutierrez.

Vodacom, which is majority-owned by Britain’s Vodafone, is South Africa’s second-biggest telecom player.

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The subsea cable to connect Africa and some other parts of the world does Africa and the internet service here a lot of good.

Subsea cable to connect Africa!

This is good news.

Here at Spacematrix, we anticipate such things, and make certain we can gain access to them just to serve you better.

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