The very first direct submarine cable link between Africa and South America is nearing completion, with Angola Cables set to reach the Brazilian part of its final construction of the South Atlantic Cable System (SACS).
Connecting Angola to Brazil, and therefore Africa to South America, the submarine cable is set to arrive in the Brazilian city of Fortaleza in early February, according to Techcentral.
The South Atlantic Cable System broke ground in August 2017, and construction work on the landing station and data center in Fortaleza, Brazil is progressing as planned.
Once the direct submarine cable is successfully installed on the Brazilian side of operations, testing will begin before the cable becomes fully operational by the third quarter of 2018.
Angola Cables CEO Antonio Nunes explained that the ‘wet plant’ installation of the cable is almost complete, and he believes that the SACS is set to provide a unique platform for users.
“From a global traffic perspective, the introduction of SACS between Angola and Brazil opens a new routing,” Nunes said, according to Businesstech.
“South America will be able to reach Europe and Asia, avoiding the U.S., and Africa will be able to reach the U.S. without linking through Europe,” he added.
“The SACS project presents a unique platform for us to build a South-South network configuration on a global scale,” he explained.
“SACS is a ‘game changer’, it provides a catalyst and springboard for the expansion of Internet Exchange Points and related infrastructure investments. Through SACS, Southern Hemisphere countries will be more connected and in a better position to drive the development of the region’s digital economy,” Nunes said.
The 6,300-km submarine cable will be able to offer a capacity of 40 Tbps between South America and Africa and a latency of approximately 63 milliseconds, according to Telecompaper.
The existing link offers a latency of around 350 milliseconds, so this will be a great improvement in terms of performance.
The South Atlantic Cable System will connect to South African telecommunications firms and operators using existing submarine cable systems that run along Africa’s west coast to Cape Town.
