The announcement also includes direct service availability between Aqaba and Milan using BlueMed’s newly activated segments.
BlueMed is Sparkle's new cable that will connect Italy with France, Greece, and several countries along the Mediterranean Sea to Aqaba in Jordan. The cable is part of the Blue & Raman subsea cable systems built in partnership with Google and other operators, which will extend to Mumbai in India.
“The landing in Aqaba marks a further step towards the realisation of our flagship BlueMed project,” said Enrico Maria Bagnasco, CEO of Sparkle.
“Moreover, by partnering with Aqaba Digital Hub we consolidate a long standing and fruitful relation while strengthening our presence in Jordan, a strategic country for the industry and a reference hub for the digitalisation of the Middle East.”
With its four proprietary fibre pairs and a capacity of ~25 Tbps per pair, BlueMed delivers diverse and ultra-high-speed connectivity in the region.
With the activation of the Middle Eastern terrestrial section, customer will benefit from high-speed Internet connections and premium capacity solutions from Aqaba to Milan using the two BlueMed segments already active and Sparkle’s Mediterranean backbone.
By the end of 2023 Sparkle’s BlueMed cable will see activations to Pomezia in Rome, Golfo Aranci in Sardinia, Bastia in Corsica and Marseille and over the course of 2024 that other routes in the Mediterranean will also go live.
“We are delighted to welcome BlueMed to our carrier-neutral data centres in Aqaba, marking a significant milestone for Aqaba Digital Hub in our journey to serve Jordan and the neighbouring markets,” said Eyad Abu Khorma, founder and CEO of Aqaba Digital Hub.
“This strategic collaboration with Sparkle and BlueMed will advance Aqaba Digital Hub's position as the first fully neutral facility in the Middle East region, further enhancing access between Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Asia and enabling additional initiatives and projects with our partners to fortify these connections.”
In Jordan, BlueMed lands in the carrier-neutral tier-3 data centre operated by Aqaba Digital Hub which hosts Sparkle’s point of present since 2019 and is already connected to the company’s Tier 1 global IP backbone Seabone.
