The cable, which is owned by a consortium, comprising China Mobile International, Meta, MTN GlobalConnect, Orange, STC, Telecom Egypt, Vodafone and WIOCC, is the world’s largest subsea cable project to date.
It recently landed in Marseille on the south coast of France, and at Ras Ghareb on Egypt’s Red Sea coast.
The South African landing is at Gqeberha, formerly known as Port Elizabeth.
Vodacom said that this is “the first submarine cable landing in the Eastern Cape region, promising greater internet capacity and acceleration of connectivity across the province and supporting South Africa’s growing digital economy”.
Diego Gutierrez, Vodacom group chief officer for international markets, said: “This latest 2Africa cable landing affirms Vodacom’s commitment to driving digital inclusion in Africa by increasing access to quality internet services and investing in the network infrastructure to support this goal.”
The Gqeberha landing is the 2Africa project’s third on the coast of South Africa, following two recent landings in the Western Cape by MTN GlobalConnect.
Vodacom is the designated landing partner, providing facilities for the cable’s installation at an existing site in the Summerstrand area.
Gutierrez said: “We cannot achieve this alone, and collaboration between other industry stakeholders and the public sector is critical in enabling more citizens across the continent to be connected.”
Alcatel Submarine Networks (ASN) is responsible for making and deploying the 2Africa cable, due for completion in 2024.
The cable system, measuring 45,000km in length with a design capacity of 180Tbps, will interconnect Europe, the Middle East via Saudi Arabia and Africa. It will connect 19 countries in Africa and 33 countries in total.
The system has four landings in South Africa and two each in Mozambique, Kenya, Nigeria, Somalia and Egypt.
