French telecommunications firm Orange has confirmed "a major investment" in West Africa submarine cable system, MainOne.

MainOne's current cable system comprises a 7,000km submarine cable, which was launched in 2010 and has landing stations in Nigeria, Ghana and Portugal.

According to a statement issued by Orange, the partnership will provide for the construction and installation of two new branches and stations

"These will connect the cable to Dakar in Senegal and Abidjan in the Côte d'Ivoire by mid-2019. Orange will be the owner of the cable station in Dakar. Orange's investment represents a major milestone for this project," Orange stated.

Jérome Barré, Chief Executive Officer of Wholesale and International Networks, Orange, said, "Orange's ambition on international networks is both to meet the needs of our affiliates in their interconnection with the Internet world and to increase our leadership on the international data services wholesale market. This partnership with MainOne will allow us to strengthen our presence, with new significant assets in West Africa."

In a separate announcement, MainOne confirmed a partnership with datacentre supplier Minkels to construct three new datacentres, in Ghana, Ivory Coast and Nigeria.

The partners did not divulge the amount invested to build the new Tier III datacentres, but confirmed they will become operational in Sagamu in 2019, Accra, Ghana in 2019 and Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire in 2020.

MainOne also announced the continued expansion of its Lekki datacentre in Lagos. The company is working to expand this datacentre, constructed in 2015, with 300 additional racks.

Funke Opeke, MainOne CEO, said, "Given the size of its markets and status as home of some of Africa's biggest economies, West Africa has a vantage opportunity to scale up infrastructure deployment to support digital transformation. Targeted investments in the region will bridge the gap in digital infrastructure and address the increasing reliance on data storage."

Christiaan van Terheijden, CEO of Minkels said his company is a part of the digital transformation of West Africa.