Brasil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) have agreed to develop and construct an undersea broadband cable that will link the nations to each other, and the USA.
The fibre-optic cable will be 34,000 kilometres in length with a capacity of 12.8 terabits per second.
The project, estimated to cost between $1.2 billion and $1.5 billion, is set for completion in 2014.
It expected to connect with the current West Africa Cable System (WACS), the Eastern Africa Submarine Cable System (EASSY) and Seacom. This will open access to 21 other African nations, including the BRICS.
The proposed cable route is from Miami, USA, to Fortaleza (Brasil), Cape Town (South Africa), Mauritius, Chennai (India), Singapore, Shantou (China) and Vladivostok (Russia).
Although all the BRICS nation have given the go-ahead for the project, Andrew Mthembu, Chairman of i3 Africa & Imphandze Investments, said: “We are willing to work with potential operators and investors to review the configuration, routing, capacity and project financing structure to take a new step in the viability of this project. The studies are available on request to potential participants in the project.”
The cable is not only set to improve the connection between BRICS nations and the USA, it will also, along with WACS and EASSY, improve communications for African citizens as well as improve Internet services on the continent.
Apart from the stated benefits, the cable will lead to improved communications resiliency in Africa and could possibly serve as a backup link should either EASSY or WACS become defective.
