African Undersea Cables

Further announcements on ACE – it looks like you’ll have to update the map again…!!

http://www.francetelecom.com/en_EN/finance/news/cp090609en.jsp

Also some news on developments with EASSy:

http://thecitizen.co.tz/newe.php?id=12932

Hi Miles. Actually I suspect not. While the map on their website still reflects a route all the way to South Africa, recent announcements about AFC/AFDB funding talk specifically about the cable terminating in Lagos. I imagine they are up for going to South Africa if the funding were to appear but with the recent ACE announcement, I wouldn’t hold my breath.

Do you have the current update on Glo1? Is Q2 2009 still a date to work with? It’s good to know that infrastucture challenge in African will gradually become a thing of the past. Thanks for the good job.

Steve

It seems as if the Seacom date has slipped to July now (based on their website – which today says “17 days to go”.

Very disappointing, after such a long wait!!

Also – a cheeky request – please consider adding the terrestrial extensions (fibre) planned for landlocked countries specifically to link to the sub cables (Zambia, Malawi, Uganda etc).

Thanks

Hi Chris. I am ok with Seacom slipping a few weeks. If they only miss their deadline by 2 or 3 weeks, it will still be a remarkable achievement.

As for terrestrial extensions, I have been trying to crowdsource an African map of terrestrial fibre on Google Maps. Africa Terrestrial Fibre Mapipedia. We have three contributors so far. Looking for more.

Hi Earnest,

When is the fibre summit taking place in nairobi? Date and venue please

Hi Paulo. Been searching for a map that actually shows the route of the LION cable. Haven’t been successful so far.

@Iwan. Thanks yes saw that one. It’s good but a little out of date I think. The map is based on my inevitably biased opinion of which cables are likely to come to fruition. IWTGC (Infinity) are not there because I’ve seen no news of them for months and no signs of them having completed their financing. Uhurunet I suspect will drown inter-governmental negotiations and bureaucracy. I thought of including WAFS but chose not to ultimately because it is a regional not international cable and also difficult to represent in an already crowded map space. Perhaps I should re-look at it.

@Liz Working on a version with the Mediterranean cables included.

Thanks Ben. I think you’re right. What was confusing me were references to the cable extending as far as Kenya. You can see a spur for what they intended on this map. I suspect TEAMs et al made that idea much less attractive.

Hi Johan. It will be important for there to be a competitive local telecom market for Namibia to really enjoy the benefits of access to WACS. Hopefully the ACE cable, which will also land in Namibia, will spur competition.

Hi Steve,

According to this message of 17 july 2009 http://www.zedian.co.uk/2009/07/internet-via-optic-fibre-arrives-in_17.html , Zambia has now hooked up to the WACS cable in Namiba via Botswana. I was unable to dig up where the exact cables are, so I couldn’t extend your mapipedia.

greets
Maarten

Many thanks! Integrating into the next version.

Hi Les. Thanks for that! Have you tried getting the UbuntuNet Alliance to partner with you on this? I think they would make an ideal partner both in having an interest in the results and in getting the right people on board. Happy to connect you if you like.

Is there any more news, apart what was on the web about the failure of the SAT-3 cable? see a.o. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8176014.stm
Cheers
iwan

Many Thanks Steve. A very good piece of information.

Do anyone have some news about connectivity offers in linked countries based on Seacom ?

Rob

Hi Steve
Thanks for taking the time to keep the undersea maps up to date, they are very useful. Following on from Rob’s question do you know if anyone is keeping similar maps for overland/cross border cables in Africa. This will help to understand the possibilities and to plan for the future in land locked countries like Malawi. I know of the SEACOM options in East Africa and several old and new initiatives in West/Central Africa but it would be good to see these all summarised in one place somewhere as you’ve done for the submarine cables.
Cheers
Ian

This is a good work u have done. kudos!

Hi Steve. Apparently Glo-1 is live! http://www.vanguardngr.com/2009/09/06/glo-1-submarine-cable-lands-in-lagos/. All the best and great map!

Good work. I’ve build Networks to work over Satellite for African ISPs. I am glad to see that Fiber Access is a REALITY. My question is on the redundancy. (SAT3 failures took weeks to resolve).
I think Satellite will remain a viable option for at least a decade.
Cheers,
Kaiser

Thanks for the tip Stuart! Clever idea, Sicily is only a stone’s throw from Tunis. Will add it to the next version.

Steve,

Tunsie Telecom are using Huawei Marine Networks to link Tunisia to Sicily see: http://www.huaweimarine.com/newsContent04.html
The Cable is called Hannibal. To my knowledge it is the first Tunisian majority owned submarine cable. This cable is going to be installed between Sept-Oct 2009….

Seacom’s arrival in South African just became a big joke now for many fans who expecting it will be a revolution for broadband market, it is even not a evolution, we still enjoy the same rate as before, nobody see any changes happened since its arrival,so all of us already lost the interest for others.

who can email me the full version of the globe submarine cable map, latest of corse!

There is an interesting (I admit the bias of being a co-author 🙂 publication on “eGY-Africa: Addressing the digital divide for science in Africa” available at:
http://elpub.wdcb.ru/journals/rjes/v11/2009ES000377/2009ES000377.pdf. The abstract is:

Adoption of information and communication technologies
and access to the Internet is expanding in Africa, but be-
cause of the rapid growth elsewhere, a Digital Divide be-
tween Africa and the rest of the world exists, and the gap
is growing. In many sub-Saharan African countries, educa-
tion and research sector suer some of the worst deficien-
cies in access to the Internet, despite progress in develop-
ment of NRENs {National Research and Education (cyber)
Networks. By contrast, it is widely acknowledged in policy
statements from the African Union, the UN, and others that
strength in this very sector provides the key to meeting and
sustaining Millennium Development Goals. Developed coun-
tries with effective cyber-capabilities proclaim the benefits
to rich and poor alike arising from the Information Revo-
lution. This is but a dream for many scientists in African institutions. As the world of science becomes increasingly
Internet-dependent, so they become increasingly isolated.
eGY-Africa is a bottom-up initiative by African scientists
and their collaborators to try to reduce this Digital Divide
by a campaign of advocacy for better institutional facili-
ties. Four approaches are being taken. The present status
of Internet services, problems, and plans are being mapped
via a combination of direct measurement of Internet per-
formance (the PingER Project) and a questionnaire-based
survey. Information is being gathered on policy statements
and initiatives aimed at reducing the Digital Divide, which
can be used for arguing the case for better Internet facil-
ities. Groups of concerned scientists are being formed at
the national, regional levels in Africa, building on existing
networks as much as possible. Opinion in the international
science community is being mobilized. Finally, and perhaps
most important of all, eGY-Africa is seeking to engage with
the many other programs, initiatives, and bodies that share
the goal of reducing the Digital Divide either as a direct
policy objective, or indirectly as a means to an end, such
as the development of an indigenous capability in science
and technology for national development. The expectation
is that informed opinion from the scientific community at
the institutional, national, and international levels can be
used to influence the decision makers and donors who are in
a position to deliver better Internet capabilities.

Thanks a lot for the map and statistics. I am trying to estimate how much telecom infrastructure investment the undersea cable systems can bring.

Interesting article:

Seacom, Main One team up for new cable:

http://www.techcentral.co.za/seacom-main-one-team-up-for-new-cable/14155/

Hi Steve, What is the progress in getting the cable landing ststions on both the E and W coasts designed and implemented ? My company (GAP Project Engineers) based in South Africa designs and implements Data Centers and Telecoms Switching Centers all over Africa – see website – we have worked in +/- 26 countries to date. Thanks.

Steve. EASSy goes live on Friday.

For completeness you should probably also now add LION2 and the MainOne/Seacom extension to the map. The TEAMS shareholding should also be updated to reflect the fact that the Govt. of Kenya has handed over its 20% to TKL.

MainOne is certainly up and running in Nigeria as noted by Ibrahim.
Yesterday (21st July) as part of the launch, MainOne had an interactive group TelePresence session involving the launch venue in Lagos and Cisco TelePresence facilities in London, Bangalore and Johannesburg.

The information on Glo website states that the Glo1 submarine cable project cost $800million dollar as against the value on this site. I think this should be updated.

Thanks for pointing that out @justict.

Hi Marcel. Actually I have left out a lot of cables in the Mediterranean. The map would be virtually unintelligible if I were to include them all. So I chose to focus on larger and/or newer cables. SEA-ME-WE 3 is significant though. I’ll experiment and see if I can fit it in and still make the map readable.

You’re absolutely right. EASSy does have a design capacity of 3.84 terabits/s now. This upgrade doesn’t have anything to do with the fibre optic cable itself but rather improvements in the terminating equipment supplied by Alcatel-Lucent. Map now updated to reflect this change.

I notice only the coastal countries seem to be interested in the cales.What about the docked countries? Aren’t they interested in bandwidth?
There are so many to choose from now.Anyone interested in last mile connectivity solutions (upto 4km and upto 50/80km) should please contact me.We are also interested in selling bandwidth

@larry This map only covers undersea cable initiatives. For a more comprehensive map that looks at terrestrial fibre as well, have a look at the UbuntuNet Alliance map at http://www.ubuntunet.net/fibre-map

Does anyone have a good rate card on STMx for these cables? We’re looking for capacity in current and future systems and I need to put together some baselnes. Thx.

Hi Steve. How come only SAT3 goes around Africa. Does it not make sense for EASY and SEACOM to at least go round to landing station at Melkbos Cape town. Having 2 landing stations in SA would improve redundancy.

Great map. Thanks

Hello Steve,
check your back ,you might just find you are sprouting wings or a small halo on your head!Thanks so much for your map,I found it while I was considering the nighmarish prospect of having to draw one myself!Doing a Phd thesis on Universal Service/Access.Keep it coming!Mille mille gracias!

By all means.

As accurate as I am able to determine. The Seacom costs come straight from the horses mouth. – http://www.seacom.mu/news/news_details.asp?iID=41

Interesting, with such excess capacity we should expect very low cost of bandwidth but this is still not the case. How does africa take advantage of redundancy at such high cost.

@Steve: I concur with you in entirety.Last mile connectivity is indeed the challenge.We provide solutions in this domain.Anyone interested should please contact me.Regards

Africa has embraced mobile internet and mobile payment in a very short space of time.
Africa needs as much capacity as possible as quickly as possible.
The cable can only be a good thing. Thanks for the map.

Glo1 services are live

@Dan I’m not that familiar with the Angolan telecoms market but my impression is that the market is not especially competitive yet and that the country is slower than others in the region to roll out the kind of terrestrial fibre that will have an impact on general bandwidth availability. So, yes, I suspect the top tier of the economy will be the principal beneficiaries of the impending fibre access at least in the short term.

Hi Alan, BTC have commitments with both EASSY/WIOCC and the WACS consortium. EASSy has been live for a while although WACS is not due for service until next year. You can see WIOCC’s planned connections at http://www.wiocc.net/map.htm. I would either contact them directly or contact BTC to find out when access in Botswana will go live. Please let us know what they have to say.

@Derek. This interview with Funke Opeke, CEO of MainOne, is probably more informative.

@Nico Yes, EIG very recently started operation but the timing with respect to the events in the Maghreb is entirely coincidental AFAIK.

An oversight. Thanks for pointing it out. Corrected now. Not sure I understand your question about the route.

You’re very welcome. Pleased it’s useful. Cheers… Steve

This is a great map – many thanks for pulling this together.

It would be interesting to see how much of all that terabyte capability is actually lit 😉

Yes, it’s interesting. They are already past the “can we have another 10 Gigs” stage and tend to upgrade in multiples.

Is anyone doing a similar map or even just a good list of inland service providers? Once you get away from the coastline the capacity and capability still has room for improvement…

Is there anybody who have any maps of what is going on in the grey spots in the middle? (ie Zambia Zimbabwe, Malawi, burundi, sudan etc). From the looks of it, you can only browse the internet on the coast?

Dyslexics of the world untie! Doh! Thanks Matt, Reinhard, and Cliff! Fixed now.

Agreed although that information tends to be a lot harder to winkle out of the operators. 🙁

the east coast countries should pull up their sock in getting connected……….i just hope WACS and ACE will join the east coast route.they seem more aggressive

Hi there Baburam…you can try your luck with either ACE cable system or try with main One in Nigeria.

Hi Steve, great map. According to this page: (http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/1967c3/gabon_telecoms_mobile_and_broadband) Gabon is getting connected to two submarine fibre cables in both 2011 and 2012. Although from your map they seem to only become connected to ACE. Unfortunately I don’t have enough money to buy the full online report, but I was wondering whether you knew which other cable will be connected to Gabon apart from ACE?

Hey Steve,

HOw goes it? What’s the lastest scoop with the ACE System? Has it landed in any country yet? Is it going to meet the RFS date?

Thanks

Darren

Isn’t Q2 for 2011 past? Is WACS active and when will they start easing pressure of the “fast” Seacom cable?

Hi Jaco. You’re right. Latest estimate seems to be Q3 2011. I’ve heard the month of September bandied about and I think that is probably realistic.

I’m surprised the WACS cable is not active yet. I created a lot of the charts for the initial survey for the WACS cable about 11-12 years ago.

Good job Steve. I also remember working on a worldwide database of known cables, again 11-12 years ago and was surprised by the shear number of (telegraph) cables that have been laid over the last 100 years.

Hi Steve
Will SAex be running to the USA?

Nice!!! We lack a propper connections to N America as most of the online games I play have hosted servers in the US.
If we can eliminate a few hops to the states and have a backup if one fails… Rosy indeed.

Another small comment: It’s quite difficult to see from your map that MainOne connects to Accra, Ghana. I know it becomes harder and harder to fit them all in, the more new cables are added.

Bonjour Francois. I am not entirely sure. This article seems to indicate that Seacom is using both SEA-ME-WE4 and TE North for transit to Europe. It does seem as if TE North is a bit of a glaring omission from my map though.

With this extensive cable system, we no longer question the volcanic impact of social media and networks have made in North Africa, with the revolutions in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. But, many people still question whether anything like this could happen in Sub-Saharan Africa. Discoveries by Nnenna Nwakanma, a prominent social media expert shows that things are happening in strange places in Sub-Saharan Africa and that the potential of social media and networks in citizen policy engagement can only be likened to a pregnancy whose term is already here.

Hi Evelyn. Thanks. France Telecom/Orange are not the most forthcoming of companies when it comes to undersea cables. They have never responded to any of my queries. In terms of news, your best bet is to set a google alert for the terms “ace cable africa”. On the ground, you can put pressure on the government to ensure that there is open access to ACE at the landing point so that no one operator can put a stranglehold on access to ACE. If memory serves, the World Bank is involved in funding the ACE connection to Sierra Leone. It would be worth asking for the terms of their funding to be made public.

National and regional fibre backbones, absolutely. Local loop fibre in anywhere but the wealthiest suburbs of the biggest cities is economically unfeasible for the near future at least. Especially as the primary client device on the continent is the mobile phone.

Steve: I meant to say that there is no reliable copper backbone in Sierra Leone, therefore it makes sense to leap forward to fiber in the local loop.

My profound thanks and appreciation to the present Government for connecting my Country sierra leone to the African Undersea Cable network. This i am quiet convinced would help to fast track our internet facilities in Mother suierra leone. Having said that . let me join hands with friends to admonish the Govt. in the area of monitoring the very system with regards it sustainability. As some body fighting corruption, please ensure that the management is well chosen with people of integrity, God fearing character, transparency and can be accountable to the people of Sierra Leone, so that we can live to enjoy this wonderful initiative. To Kotor I.B. i say bravo

Hi Michael. Thanks for pointing that out! I wasn’t aware that Guinea-Bissau had dropped off the list. I guess it makes sense given the proximity of other landing points. Thanks too for the link to the new ACE map.

Hi Michael, any updates on when WACS will be live or what the proposed latency from London to Melkbosstrand will be ? Also do you know when the SAT2 cable system will be turned off ?

Hi Cheryl. The viability of ACE in Namibia is a difficult question to answer. Much depends on the will of government and industry to build the kind of affordable national infrastructure that will reach all Namibians. If that happens then I would say yes, ACE landing in Namibia is viable. As to it being slower than WACS, no. Most cables these days have some fibre dedicated to express routes and some to local connections. I believe ACE is no different. However, even for the local connections, the data transfer rate would be the same but there might be some small increase in latency. Either way the difference would only be noticeable to businesses where milliseconds increase in latency can make a difference such as in automated trading systems and the like.

Hi Cheryl. You put your finger on a key challenge. Competition is necessary to drive the cost of access down. The good news for Namibia is that both WACS and ACE will land there which should introduce some competition but there also need to be competition for the delivery of rural access services and more than just two players that engage in price following.

That Singapore meeting was long time ago. WACS was initially scheduled to be in operation in Q3 2011, but that date has been postponed quite a while ago. It seems to be impossible to find reliable information, but various sources indicate “early in 2012”, “Q1 2012” or “first half of 2012”, with Q1 2012 and early 2012 being the more frequently read.

So much for playing games this december. :<

Still! Q1 is fine, happy its not 'a couple of years' ,like stated in the newspaper.

Hi Darren,

Agree! The ACE cable landing was a great day for sure!! I’ve posted photos of the event to Facebook.

Regards,
–Bob

Has the ACE cable landed in Guinea Conakry? If so who are the owners of the cable?

Hi Steve – you need to take a look at the new WASACE cable announced today. It’s going to link Africa with South America, and then onwards to North America and Europe. This one will look nice on your map!

http://www.capacitymagazine.com/Article/2939309/News/Multi-continent-spanning-WASACE-submarine-cable-system-announced.html

Hi Rich. Nothing concrete I’m afraid other than the news of the USD31M loan from the World Bank

Hi George. Busy working on mapping terrestrial fibre links (see http://manypossibilities.net/afterfibre/) although it is not going as fast as I had initially hoped. We are currently stalled waiting for developers to produce a rendering engine for the map. I hope to have more to announce on this shortly.

Can someone provide me statstics or information/references on the impact of submarine cables around Africa and the rest of the world

great information… thanks so much!

Hi Richard. That is the SAFE cable which is effectively an extension of the SAT3 cable into Asia. See http://www.safe-sat3.co.za/

Hi Richard. My understanding is that the cable has landed but will not be lit until sometime later this year. This article suggests that it will be in the 1st half of 2012 which is probably a good guess.

Would be nice to include an additional row showing Jhb – London round-trip-time for each

Hi Richard,
How is Baharicom Development Company coming? Are they still part of the ACE consortium?

Hi Rich, Have you heard of any of the other signatories having problems in the ACE consortium?

Hi Steve,

Is the ACE cable in Freetown, Sierra Leone active? If so, what is the next step for the government and the people of Sierra Leone? Internet in Sierra Leone is too slow, unreliable and expensive.
Thanks

Hi Steve,

Great site, thanks for all the info. Quick question, do you have any idea who will be handling ACE in Nigeria? I don’t see any Nigerian companies as part of the consortium.

Thanks.

Hi Jaco. No word on capacity that I have been able to detect. Have been looking for more news about it but that is the only article I have seen.

As to WACS, May is a possibility but I suspect it is likely to be Q3 some time.

Indeed, I saw that, as have Telegeography. I’ve been hanging fire waiting for some more noise about the project to appear. I am usually a little slow to add projects.

When WACS will be finally relased?

This article mentions MTN Nigeria going live on WACS in two weeks – mid of April:

http://nationalmirroronline.net/business/business-and-finance/35592.html

This article mentions commercial services being available from May on:

http://www.techcentral.co.za/telkoms-broadband-future-all-the-details/30618/

To me, it is really strange that there is so little communication about that current state of implementation and launch dates.

Hi Steve,

yes, it is really strange and frustrating and I’d say I only believe it when I see it. MTN Nigeria says it will go online in two weeks from now. That was said on 6th April (http://www.dailytrust.com.ng/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=159077).

Still in SA/Nam, you don’t here anything…

Good Good news. But is Telkom geared to release the bandwidth commercially?

When will they upgrade the ailing 384K consumer DSL to something such as (heaven forbids!!!) 1Mbps?

Just got the following hit on Google Alerts.

http://www.subtelforum.com/articles/2012/brics-cable-unveiled-for-direct-and-cohesive-communcations-services-between-brazil-russia-india-china-and-south-africa/

Seems insane, but there is a number of cables that connect South America to their northern continent as well as the Caribbean islands.

According to what I have read the Africa/S.America cable will be connected to the USA and Europe in turn with the same speed specification.

Yes subseaworldnews.com is also running a great article on the new BRICS cable

http://subseaworldnews.com/2012/04/17/brics-unveils-new-submarine-cable-system/

In my opinion, any cable that doesn’t have ships in the water laying cable, is still looking for investors. I think that applies to BRICS, to WASACE, to SAEx, to the Telebras/Angola Cables project, and to the southern half of the ACE cable.

Steve, isn’t the “brazil-russia-INDIA-china-south africa” cable supposed to connect to India somewhere? In your map it looks like it goes straight to Singapore and dodges India… Apart from that, great map as ever. Logarithmic scaling, very clever.

We are cautiously optimistic! This will certainly transform the technological landscape of my country if implemented properly and is made affordable to the masses.

Hi Chris. This has always been as much a map of the possible as the actual and the legend does indicate which are live and which not. But I think you have a point. I have experimented in the past with different ways of display current versus planned but none of them have really been terribly satisfactory. Here are a few things I have tried.

Dotted Lines
https://secure.flickr.com/photos/ssong/6322057930/

Lines with transparency
https://secure.flickr.com/photos/ssong/6324683515/

Monochrome Lines
https://secure.flickr.com/photos/ssong/6328436959/

Grateful for any feedback or suggestions for what you think might work. And what to do with a cable that might only get half-completed like ACE?

This just came across my email.
http://www.techcentral.co.za/the-inside-story-of-the-15bn-brics-cable/31530/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+co%2FUqJF+%28TechCentral%29

No I haven’t…

They seem very hasty with the BRICS cable, and seeming that it would be government funded, it might come quicker than expected.

That Russian cable needs to travel a bit before it will get anywhere close to Moscow where most of their population lives.

WACS is active:
http://allafrica.com/stories/201205120021.html
http://www.techcentral.co.za/650m-wacs-lights-up-africas-west-coast/31744/

“Adrian Moss, chairman of the Wacs management committee, says the cable was originally meant to go live in 2011, but that this was impossible due to legislative changes, civil unrest and other unforeseen circumstances in some of the nations involved in the project.”

Q&A with Bert Stangl, Executive Vice President, Project & CFO of Submarines at Alcatel-Lucent:
http://www.itnewsafrica.com/2012/05/wacs-goes-live-in-cape-town/

If I were an ISP I would only be using WACS for backup/redundancy until it was clear that all the bugs have been shaken out of the cable. Also, many ISPs have existing contracts for access on other routes. They may wait until those contracts expire before switching over to WACS.

It would be very neat to have a little desktop utility that could tell you which cable you were on by virtue of a traceroute or similar.

Tracing route to http://www.l.google.com [74.125.132.106]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 1 ms 1 ms 1 ms fritz.box [192.168.178.1]
2 32 ms 32 ms 30 ms WVS-7301-BR01-IPB-41-205-152-130.ipb.na [41.205.
152.130]
3 33 ms 30 ms 31 ms 41.205.155.1
4 47 ms 49 ms 48 ms KHP-BOR05-KHP-PE05-TenGE [41.205.155.194]
5 222 ms 221 ms 223 ms bru-22-r23-p0-3-2.car.belbone.be [80.84.23.9]
6 238 ms 239 ms 239 ms 94.102.160.63
7 226 ms 225 ms 225 ms bru-22-r5-t7-3.car.belbone.be [80.84.18.83]
8 230 ms 230 ms 230 ms 94.102.162.201
9 298 ms 256 ms 249 ms 94.102.162.208
10 242 ms 244 ms 243 ms 74.125.50.21
11 237 ms 265 ms 311 ms 209.85.240.63
12 249 ms 246 ms 234 ms 209.85.253.92
13 243 ms 243 ms 242 ms 72.14.232.134
14 239 ms 239 ms 244 ms 209.85.252.83
15 * * * Request timed out.
16 238 ms 239 ms 239 ms wb-in-f106.1e100.net [74.125.132.106]

I ran a trace route, it doesnt go through South Africa like it used to but directly to Europe, so its seems to be live.. Yey.. Wacs is here..

http://www.informante.web.na/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=9997:wacs-launched-in-cape-town&catid=19:inside-pages&Itemid=100

Yep, its not live yet.

Just saw this http://www.hellkom.co.za/newsviewer/local/8496/Seacom%20to%20double%20capacity while browsing Hellkom.co.za to see when Telkom will start upgrading the 384Kbps DSL to 1Mbps.

This is an extract from Adrew Blum’s article: ” A Journey to the Center of the Internet” Does anyone know which 2 cables he is referring to?

When next winter’s storms subside, a specialized ship will begin a slow crossing, lowering a skinny cable into its wake along a precisely prescribed path: the shortest distance between New York and London. Owned by Summit, N.J.-based Hibernia Atlantic, the $300 million wire will bring the two financial capitals 5.2 milliseconds closer together—a boon to high-speed electronic traders.

Four thousand miles to the south, a second ship owned by a different company will move in parallel, laying a cable that will link—for the first time—Brazil and Angola. And in 2014, it will happen again, twice: from Virginia Beach to San Sebastián, Spain, and from Brazil to Nigeria. For those with memories of the global cable-laying spree that helped to drive telecommunications companies into bankruptcy in the 1990s, this will raise eyebrows. But all those cables are nearly full now. And there are other parts of the world demanding direct connections.

Thank-you

Whether they are sustainable or not is more of a problem for the cable investors than for Africans because they are literally “sunk costs”. Even if a cable goes bust the asset will still be there and will be sold off to someone else.

Hi. Great site and great work. Thanks so much 🙂
A little query….. The SACS cable carrying 40TB to Luanda only?? Would that be because it links with the 40TB WASACE?
If this all materialises in 2014 as planned aren’t we in South Africa going to be overloaded with bandwidth options?

Cheers. Martin, Port Elizabeth

Hi Martin. SACS is a deal between Angola Cables and the Brazilian state-owned telco Telebras. No doubt they are negotiating onward traffic on either side. I don’t think anyone believes all of the proposed cables for the South Atlantic will come to fruition. I hope one does soon though. South Africa could also benefit from a new cable to the far east but I think the BRICS cable is among the shakier propositions.

Check this out! http://angolacables.co.ao/en/home/

You’d have to be more specific. What kind of fibre company? FTTH? Backhaul? Metro? Local, national?

What we do not see is the inter connectivity to the Inland (land locked) countries in Africa. How are they linked and what would help speed up their connectivity . Is there a robust Inland fibre network on offer in the near future?

Jon, I’ve plotted out the many cities mentioned in the Congo news but don’t have a sense of the route of the fibre. Any chance you might be able to connect the dots on this map https://mapsengine.google.com/map/edit?mid=zcDJJ03aL4_M.kFojbuW2HU5g to create a picture of the fibre backbone in the Republic of Congo?

I don’t have the fibre route map at hand. When I get a hold of one, I’ll send you a copy.

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and was compelled to email you directly and share with you the Security
and Surveillance Systems / Products we recommend for safe Operations.

With
the Joint-Venture Strategy ShadowAir Ltd. Airborne ISR Solutions are
the industry leader in Security Solutions involving Ground and Aerial
Reconnaissance. We deploy the most advanced and capable Planes,
Aerostats and UAVs equipped with the best multi-role, special mission
Sensors available in the world.

We are affiliated with one
of the Largest Company who are Contractor for Optical Fiber Projects
(Offshore / Onshore). Let us know how we can help you regarding the
same?

Umer Manzoor

V.P. Business Development

ShadowAir LTD.
Airborne ISR Solutions
300 Center Street, Suite G-214
Superior, CO 80027

Tel No. +1-888-731-3092 (Toll-Free)
+1-303-731-3092 (Direct)
Fax No. +1-888-731-3092
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: http://www.shadowair.com
DUNS:146670778 CAGE Code: 3UXD5

That is a big ask. 🙂 Your chances of getting help will improve to the extent that a) you make your questions as specific as possible and, b) engage in a quid pro quo by sharing what you find.

Thank you for a quick response, I am working from ground o. I will share what I find as soon as I getr more information. Please whatever you can provide will help in a long way. Thank you

Yeah, I’m a fan. Liquid Telecom is the coolest fibre company on the continent.