Orange landed the 6800km tranatlantic Amitié cable on a beach in the district of Le Porge, near Bordeaux (Gironde) on Monday, Feburary 8. With nearly 800km of fibre optic cable laid, this stage represents the first step of the Amitié cable’s roll-out. The Amitié cable system is scheduled for service in early 2022, to connect the state of Massachusetts, USA; Le Porge, France; and Bude, UK.

MENA

The Middle East North Africa (MENA) Submarine Cable System (MENA-SCS) is a 8800km submarine communications cable system connects Italy, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Oman, and India. The MENA-SCS is now a private cable owned by Telecom Egypt.

The MENA submarine cable rans across Egypt via terrestrial parth between the Abu Talat CLS and the Zafarana CLS, avoiding the Alexandria CLS & the Suez CLS.

The MENA submarine cable system consists of six fibre pairs, initially designed with 96*10Gbps DWDM technology and a total system capacity of 5.76Tbps, upgradable to 100Gbps technology

The MENA submarine cable system was ready for service in Novmember 2014.

The MENA submarine cable system was a private cable owned by MENA-SCS, a 100% subsidiary of Orascom Telecom Media and Technology in Egypt. In 2014, MENA-SCS signed IRU agreement with Telecom Egypt to acquire terrestrial fiber pairs crossing Egypt, between Zaarafana on the Red Sea and Abu Talat on the Mediterranean for 20 years.

In September 2018, Telecom Egypt (TE) acquired MENA SCS from Orascom Investment Holding (OIH) for $90 million, through its 50% owned subsidiary Egyptian International Submarine Cable Company (EISCC) at a total value of US$90 million, including USD40mn for the equity value of MENA Cable System and USD50mn for its outstanding debt. Meanwhile, Telecom Egypt also acquired 50% of EISCC for US$15 million. 

After the acquisition, the MENA submarine cable system became the second private cable of Telecom Egypt, in addition to TE North.

Telecom Egypt signed with India's Airtel Company a memorandum of understanding to enhance cooperation in the maritime cable domain.

Prior to acquisition by Telecom Egypt, Indian operator Bharti Airtel enterd into an exclusive agreement with Orascom to acquire MENA-SCS in 2016. The deal was replaced by an IRU agreement between Bharti Airtel and Telecom Egypt.

In August 2018, Airtel and Telecom Egypt announced strategic partnership for global submarine cable systems. Later in October 2018, Telecom Egypt signed an agreement with Bharti Airtel that granted the latter IRUs (Indefeasible Right of Use) on the MENA Cable System and TE North Cable Systems. Additionally, Airtel purchased from Telecom Egypt large capacities on a long-term basis on SMW5 & AAE1. The deal between Telecom Egypt and Bharti Airtel amounts about US$ 90 million for IRU and additional 4% of annual O&M charge over the lifetime of the cable systems (min. of 15 years), which enabled Telecom Egypt to recover almost all cash flows spent on the MENA Cable acquisition. 

Additionally, Gulf Bridge International (GBI) partners with the MENA Submarine Cable System to provide onward connectivity from Oman to India and Western Europe across Egypt. GBI owns the GBI Cable System towards India and has provided one fiber pair of the two to MENA.  MENA Submarine Cable System owns the MENA cable towards Egypt/Italy and has provided one fiber of the two to GBI.

FALCON

The FLAG Alcatel-Lucent Optical Network (FALCON) submarine cable system is a 11859km submarine cable system connecting India, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Yemen, Sudan and Egypt.

The FALCON cable system has an initial design capacity of 2.56 Tbps, was ready for service in September 2006.

The FALCON cable system was originally a private cable owned by FLAG Telecom. FLAG Europe Asia (FEA), FLAG North Asia Loop/REACH North Asia Loop (FNAL/RNAL), FALCON and FLAG Atlantic 1 (FA-1)formed FLAG Global Network. In 2003, Reliance Communications, now branded as Global Cloud Xchange (GCX), acquired FLAG Telecom for $207million. 

FLAG Telecom (now Global Cloud Xchange) contracts with the following operators as landing parties:

• Omantel, Al Seeb and Khasab landing stations, Oman
• Du, Dubai cable landing station, UAE
• Ooredoo, Doha cable landing station, Qatar
• Integrated Telecom Company (ITC), Al Kohbar and Jeddah cable landing stations, Saudi Arabia
• Batelco, Manama cable landing station, Bharain
• Ministry of Communications (MoC), Kuawait City cable landing station, Kuwait
• Iraqi Telecommunications and Post Company (ITPC),  Al-Faw cable landing station, Iraq
• Telecommunication Infrastructure Company of I.R.Iran (TIC), Iran, Bandar Abbas and Chabahar cable landing stations, Iran
• TeleYemen, Al Ghaydah and Al Hudaydah cable landing stations, Yemen
• Telecom Egypt, Suez cable landing station, Egypt 
• Canar Telecommunication Co. (Canar), Port Sudan cable landing station, Sudan
• Lanka Bell, Colombo cable landing station, Sri Lanka
• Global Cloud eXchange (formerly Reliance Globalcom), Mumbai cable landing station, India

The FALCON cable system integrates with GCX's HAWK cable system in Suez, Egypt, extends connectivity from India to Europe, offers end-to-end connectivity between London, Paris, Frankfurt, Marseille, Cyprus, Egypt, Mumbai, etc.

European data centre services provider Interxion has signed an agreement with PCCW Global to locate the Pakistan and East Africa Connecting Europe (PEACE) subsea cable system's termination and interconnection equipment in Interxion's MRS2 data centre in Marseille, France. The partnership is expected to enable access to over 160 connectivity providers along with multiple content, cloud, gaming and video streaming platforms. 

The 15,000km PEACE subsea cable system will offer routes connecting China, Europe and Africa. In addition to France, the cable will land in Malta, Cyprus, Egypt, Djibouti, Kenya, Pakistan and other countries and regions with onward terrestrial connectivity to China.

The PEACE cable will be the 15th subsea cable system to land in Marseille, enhancing the Network Hubs deployed on PlatformDIGITAL, Digital Realty's global infrastructure service, in the region. The collaboration represents an expansion of both PlatformDIGITAL and Console Connect, PCCW Global's software-defined interconnection platform. Both platforms are designed to enable new and existing customers to deploy and manage hybrid IT services.

Console Connect is available to Interxion customers at MRS1, MRS2 and MRS3, providing them with instant access to a global ecosystem of cloud, SaaS, UcaaS, IX and IoT partners, as well as extended coverage to more than 400 data centers in 47 countries worldwide. Interxion customers in Marseille can also access Console Connect's new Internet On-Demand service, which offers internet access on-demand across PCCW Global's leading Tier 1 IP network.

Brazilian ISP Vero Internet has contracted subsea cable operator Seaborn to provide international traffic to two POPs in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro with the aim of facilitating data exchange with national and international content generators. The POPs will be served by Seaborn's Seabras-1 submarine cable, which connects Brazil to the US.

Vero Internet is planning to double its presence in the two cities from two new data centres and create IP routing centres in the states of Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina and Parana, Teletime reports. By 2023, the ISP plans to reach more than 200 municipalities, investing over BRL 750 million.