MainOne has announced a metro fibre infrastructure project in two states of Nigeria, with support from Facebook.

According to a statement MainOne is building and operating approximately 750 km terrestrial fibre infrastructure in Edo and Ogun States, described by the partners as two of Nigeria's fastest growing states.

"These open-access transport networks will provide metro fiber connectivity to reach more than 1,000,000 people in Benin City, Abeokuta, Sagamu and 10 other towns by connecting mobile operators' base stations, Internet Service providers, Points of presence (POPs), and public locations including schools and hospitals," reads an excerpt from the statement.

This partnership will leverage MainOne's strength as a wholesale telecoms Infrastructure service provider with investment from Facebook and support from local regulatory and state authorities to further deepen broadband penetration in Nigeria.

Ibrahima Ba, Network Investments Lead for Emerging Markets at Facebook, said: "We are working closely with MainOne and other partners to accelerate broadband deployment. In Nigeria, we are bringing together Facebook's learnings from scaling our global infrastructure with MainOne's knowledge of the local environment to develop and test new working models for multiple operators to access common infrastructure."

Funke Opeke, MainOne's chief executive officer, added "We believe that this partnership and the open-access network we have developed will be beneficial to improving the quality of access and accelerating the digital transformation in Ogun and Edo States."

In early February 2019 EMEA-focused provider of satellite data communications services Avanti Communications Group partnered with MainOne to bolster broadband penetration in Nigeria.

MainOne will leverage Avanti's newest satellite, HYLAS 4, launched in April 2018 to enable highly flexible capacity services with 100% country coverage of Nigeria.