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East Africa: Work Starts On Eassy Undersea Cable
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Business Day (Johannesburg)
28 March 2008
Posted to the web 28 March 2008
Lesley Stones
Johannesburg
WORK has begun on a submarine cable designed to boost Africa's bandwidth by 2010.
The East African Submarine Cable System (EASSy) is a fibreoptic link that will connect 21 African countries to each other and the rest of the world to provide fast, high-quality internet access and international communications.
The 25 backers include MTN, Neotel, Telkom and 16 other African operators. They are contributing $247m all told, with more than $50m from the South African players.
The World Bank Group's IFC division is putting in $18,2m. Five financial institutions are providing long-term loans of $70,7m. The 10000km cable will be laid by Alcatel-Lucent and should be operational by the first half of 2010, and the process that has just begun is a survey of the sea bed to confirm the eventual route.
"We are very pleased that this long-awaited submarine cable has formally been sponsored by the majority of the regional operators and by some of the leading international industry players," said IFC director Mohsen Khalil.
"The EASSy cable will transform the telecommunications landscape in the region.
"It will provide internet and other communications access for 250-million Africans, and substantially reduce costs for consumers and businesses."
Consumers on the east coast of Africa pay the world's highest prices for internet access, spending typically spending $200-$300 a month.
Once EASSy is in place the cost of international bandwidth should fall two-thirds, attracting many new subscribers.
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Prices would keep falling as competition between service providers increased, Khalil said, stimulating development of the call-centre industry and other telecoms-intensive ventures.
The World Bank is helping to link up 13 landlocked countries with the cable. But it will not be the first new cable to reach SA. The rival $600m, 17000km Seacom cable is due next year.
Neotel is involved in both projects, and will own the Seacom cable once it enters local waters. Seacom president Brian Herlihy predicts international bandwidth fees will dive by 80% when its cable goes live on June 17, 2009.
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