SEACOM Reports Update on Status of Cable
Sea Cable System (SEACOM), which is laying a 15,000 km submarine cable from South Africa, Mozambique, Madagascar, Kenya and Tanzania to India and Europe via Egypt, has announced that construction is on schedule and the cable is set to enter commercial service as planned in June 2009. According to a company press release, 10,000 km of the cable has been manufactured so far and Tyco Telecommunications will begin shipping terrestrial equipment this month. In addition, shore end cables for each landing point will also begin to be laid in August and from October the first of three cable-laying ships will start to lay the actual cable itself. The final splicing, which involves connecting all cable sections together, will happen in April 2009 and the cable is due to enter commercial service in June 2009.
Significance: The SEACOM cable reached full and unconditional financial closure on 9 November 2007 and the construction contract awarded to Tyco Telecommunications was signed on 13 November 2007. In February this year, SEACOM announced that construction work on the cable had begun. ‘We are able to meet the African market’s urgent requirements for cheap and readily available bandwidth within less than a year’, said a company press release.
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